Timing is Everything

If you’re a cook, you know that one of the most important things when cooking is timing. That lesson became painfully clear to me the first year that I fixed Thanksgiving dinner. Timing is everything in the kitchen. How many times have you gotten halfway into a recipe, only to realize that it was going to take much longer than you had anticipated because it was a little more complicated than you thought? Of course, the obvious lesson there is to completely read the recipe before you start it – but sometimes things just happen.

If I ever publish a cookbook, I’d like to organize it by the amount of time it takes to fix the recipe. One chapter would be “All the Time in the World aka Weekend Cooking.” Another would be “I Have Some Time but I Don’t Want to Spend all of it in the Kitchen on a Weeknight.”  A chapter with some extremely short recipes would be “I Had a Crappy Day at Work, I’m Tired and I Really Don’t Want to Cook but I Can’t Afford to Eat Out.”  “Aw Forget It, I’m Just Calling the Pizza Place” wouldn’t have any recipes at all – just a place to write down the Domino’s Pizza number and a place to put the take-out menus.

The following recipe would be filed under the chapter “All the Time in the World aka Weekend Cooking.” Sadly, I prepared it on a night when what I really wanted was a recipe from the “I Had a Crappy Day at Work, I’m Tired and I Really Don’t Want to Cook but I Can’t Afford to Eat Out” chapter. This is a labor intensive, time intensive recipe so be warned. What makes it so time consuming is the necessity of soaking the eggplant for at least 30 minutes before starting the recipe to get all the bitterness out of the eggplant. I hadn’t really planned on the 30 minute soak (there’s that not reading the full recipe thing again) but I did manage to get in a quick 30 minute workout on my bike trainer while the eggplant did its thing. That also meant that I had already burned some calories before eating dinner so that I could eat an extra piece of this yummy eggplant.

I found this recipe in one of my ‘go-to’ cookbooks; Bon Appetit’s “Fast Easy Fresh” (perhaps they didn’t read all the recipes either).

Baked Eggplant Marinara

Ingredients

8 ½-inch thick center cut eggplant rounds (from 2 small eggplants)

All purpose flour (for dredging)

2 eggs

1 ½ cups breadcrumbs

¾ cup grated Parmesan cheese

4 T olive oil

1 cup ricotta cheese

1 ½ cups marinara sauce

¾ cup grated mozzarella

NOTE: The Bon Appetit recipe did not call for soaking the eggplant so I’m including instructions

 Slice the eggplant and place slices in a colander sitting on a plate. Sprinkle the eggplant with salt   and toss slices to coat. Let eggplant sit for 30 minutes then rinse it well in cold water. Let it drain and then pat slices dry with a paper towel.

Preheat oven to 350°. Lightly oil a baking dish. Place flour in a shallow bowl. Whisk eggs in another shallow bowl. Mix breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese in a third shallow bowl. Coat eggplant rounds with flour, then eggs, then breadcrumb mixture, patting to adhere.

 Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add 4 eggplant rounds to skillet. Cook until golden brown, about 3 minutes per side; transfer to baking dish. Repeat with remaining oil and eggplant slices. Spread 2 tablespoons ricotta cheese over each round. Top each with sauce and mozzarella cheese, dividing equally between rounds. Bake until rounds are heated through and cheese is melted, about 15 minutes.

Although it takes a while to prep, it doesn’t take long to cook. Just enough time for you to clean up the mess you made in the kitchen. Remember, timing is everything.