Eggplant Napoleon

Eggplant. One of my favorite foods, my mother's favorite as well. Take just about any cuisine and mold it around an eggplant and you have me on board. Same goes for cauliflower, but that's for another day.

While you might not guess by the blonde hair, or even my mother's blonde hair, or dad's red hair - but I got me some Italian blood. Yup, some legit Naples Barber came over as a stowaway in the early 1900s kind of American Italian family. The kind that makes a giant dish of eggplant parm for a normal dinner, alongside a HUGE table of accompanying food. 

This is a lighter, healthier version of a eggplant parm, without the heart stopping qualities, but just as much flavor. The nice part about this is that it is part salad part stacked dinner dish, and I easily eat 3 stacks for dinner. Should I? Probably not,  I SHOULD in fact just have one or two and have a side salad, but honestly when you live alone making dinner AND a side salad is like asking for Hogwarts to be real.

The recipe here is originally based off of a wonderful Eggplant Napoleon from Tanoreen, a Mediterranean/greek restaurant in NYC. Their published cookbook Olives, Lemon and Zaa'tar is filled with pages upon pages of amazing recipes. Seriously, it's a hidden gem of greek food.

The Tanoreen version uses babaganoush and mutbal, which is an eggplant salad however I really prefer to keep things on the lighter side when prepping a dish like this one for dinner. I replace the stacks with a little hummus (straight from the store) a slice of vine-ripened tomato, fresh parsley and a little balsamic reduction. Because a drizzle of sugary vinegar goodness can't hurt a fly.

If you are going to serve this for guests or for more than 2 people for dinner as a side, I would highly consider setting out  plate with your stacks for everyone to take individually - family style. This way they can fight for how much each person gets and leave you out of the giant argument that is about to happen.

Ingredients

1 eggplant

3 tbs basil pesto

1/2 cup olive oil

juice of a lemon

salt

pepper

1/4 cup panko

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

1 egg

1/4 cup flour for dredging

2 vine ripened tomatoes

hummus

Instructions

Start by prepping the eggplant, peel and slice into 1/2 inch rounds. For eggplant dishes you want to salt the eggplant first, by letting them sit out for a half an hour with a pinch of salt to let them start to sweat. Once they start to sweat the water leaves and lets your marinate sink in.

While the eggplant is sweating, create your marinade by whisking together the pesto, lemon juice and olive oil. In a ziplock baggy combine the eggplant and the marinade and let sit for 2hrs-24hrs. I am usually in the latter category, prepping the night before. This recipe is great because of the marinade, don't skip this step.

When you are ready to prep and cook your eggplant, heat your oven to 375F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In three separate dishes prep the line to coat your eggplant.

Dish one: flour, dish two: one egg beat with 2 tbs water, dish three mix the panko, parmesan and 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley.

For each slice of eggplant, dredge in flour, dip in egg and then roll in the panko-parm mix to cover completely. As you go, you might need more of an ingredient, better to have more of each on hand just in case, esp. the panko-parm-parsley mix. Just be sure not to put too much out to begin with, it cannot be re-used because of the raw egg.

Place each eggplant slice on the baking sheet once ready in the panko-parm-parsley coating and bake on 375 for 40 minutes flipping halfway. They should be golden and the kitchen will smell amazing.

To make your stack, start with an eggplant slice, then add a tomato slice, followed by a dollop (about a tablespoon) of hummus, another eggplant slice, another small dollop (half tsp) of hummus and follow with chopped fresh parsley and a drizzle of balsamic glaze.

To reheat for leftovers, use a toaster oven to keep crispy.

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