Behold, a savoury recipe! 🤣
I can’t remember the last time I posted a non-sweet recipe on my blog. Despite my love for sweet treats and baked goods, I do throughly enjoy savoury flavours too. For some reason I just don’t post many of those recipes here. I think because many aren’t my own creations but cooking from one of my many cookbooks (some of these I share in my Off The Shelf series).
For this recipe however, I have borrowed things I have learnt from other recipes and created this baked pasta dish. The inspiration was the fact that I had both eggplant and wood smoked scamorza cheese in the fridge. And while the combination of those two things would normally have been reaching for Alison Roman’s recipe for a ‘Little Eggplant Parm’, which I do highly recommend, I felt like something a little different this time.
Both the method of cooking eggplant and the tomato sauce for this recipe are highly influenced by Alison’s Eggplant Parm recipe. Baking eggplant is so much easier than frying and I will be forever grateful to Alison for showing me how.
The scamorza cheese I used for this dish is wood smoked, and along with the red wine vinegar in the tomato sauce, the flavour is a real hero in the dish. I don’t think all scamorza’s are wood smoked, but if you can find one that is (or a wood smoked buffalo mozzarella) it will be well worth it. You can use more regular mozzarella cheese instead, however the flavour won’t be the same. I would add more Parmesan (or similar) to the top of the baked pasta for flavour, or even add some anchovies and/or baby capers to the tomato sauce while it is cooking - For anchovies, add your desired amount to the onions and garlic when the onion is beginning to soften, stir and allow the anchovies to melt away. For capers, add your desired amount when you add the basil to the sauce.
Baked Pasta with Wood Smoked Scamorza and Eggplant
Ingredients:
2 medium eggplants
olive oil
salt
pepper
x2 400g cans whole tomatoes such as San Marzano
1 brown onion, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1/2 bunch basil leaves thinly sliced
2 tbsp tomato paste/concentrate
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
250-290g medium sized pasta such as penne, fusilli or I used casarecce (I used approx. 1/2 a 500g packet of pasta, but use a minimum of 250g)
1/2 cup grated mozzarella cheese
140g wood smoked scamorza cheese, cut into small chunks
2 tbsp finely grated pecorino/parmesan/grana padano
Method:
Preheat oven to 220 degrees Celsius.
Line a large baking tray or sheet pan.
Cut the eggplant into 1-1.5cm slices so you end up with fat round discs of eggplant. Place the eggplant discs in a single layer on your prepared tray, drizzle with some olive oil and sprinkle with some salt and pepper.
Bake for about 30-40 mins, turning the eggplant pieces over after 20 minutes to both sides cook evenly.
The eggplant will be done when it is a deep golden brown and softened. Once cooked set aside.
To make the tomato sauce, add about 1-2 tbsp olive oil to a large round pan (a bonus if it is oven safe too) over medium heat.
Add the onions and cook for about five minutes, stirring now and then. Add the garlic and continue to cook with the onions until the onions have softened and are starting to turn a little golden (5-10 minutes).
Add the two cans of tomatoes, and squish the whole tomatoes into chunks. Pour a little water (a couple of tablespoons max.) into each tomato can, and swirl around to catch any tomato left. Add this to the pan, and stir.
Allow the tomato mixture to cook over low to medium heat until it starts to gently bubble and thicken a little. Add the tomato paste and basil and stir to combine.
Bring a large pot of water to the boil, all the while keeping the tomato sauce gently cooking, stirring now and then.
Reduce the oven temp to 180 degrees Celsius (or turn on and heat to 180 if you turned it off after the eggplant).
Cook the pasta in the boiling water according to packet instructions.
While the pasta is boiling, add the red wine vinegar to the tomato sauce and stir to combine.
Cut the eggplant up into quarters (or half for smaller pieces), and add to the sauce.
Stir to combine and turn the heat off.
Once the pasta is ready, drain and add to the tomato sauce and stir so the pasta is evenly coated in the sauce.
If your pan is oven proof, you can scatter the cheeses over and place into the oven. Otherwise transfer the contents of the pan to an oven proof dish, then scatter over all the cheeses.
Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the cheeses have melted and are golden brown.
Serves 6.
