Meatless Monday: Eggplant, Mozzarella and Saffron Rice Bake
My CSA share has produced several eggplants in the last few weeks and I was stumped by what to do with them all. One of the best recipes I’ve found to date is this Eggplant Parmesan.
But (here I go sounding like a broken record), I don’t have much time to cook these days. And that dish takes too much time. Anything that requires several steps in the prep process doesn’t get a moment’s consideration from me right now. I need easy. I need fairly quick.
Enter this recipe.
A call out to the Twitterverse for new ways to use eggplant resulted in my friend Jen sharing a link to a Bon Appetit dish. The original recipe made what seemed to be enough to feed an army, so I cut way back since I only have to feed a party of two. I also made a few other adjustments to the ingredients, but luckily I didn’t screw up the deliciousness of the dish along the way!
Even though it takes a little while to bake, overall the prep is pretty simple and painless. Served with a side salad, this is a very filling, meatless comfort meal that is sure to show up at our house quite often from here on out.
Eggplant, Mozzarella, and Saffron Rice Bake
Serves 4. Adapted from Bon Appetit.
Ingredients:
1 Tbsp + 1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 medium onion, diced
1/2 cup arborio rice
Pinch of saffron
1/8 cup dry white wine
3/4 cup vegetable broth or water
Kosher salt
1 large eggplant, cut crosswise into 1/4-inch rounds
Freshly ground black pepper
2 1/2 cups store-bought marinara, divided
8 oz shredded mozzarella cheese, divided
1/2 cup grated Parmesan, divided
Directions:
Preheat oven to 425°. Heat 1 Tbsp olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add onion; cook, stirring often, until softened, about 8 minutes. Add rice; cook, stirring constantly, for 3 minutes. Stir in saffron, then wine. Cook until wine reduces slightly, about 1 minute. Add broth; season with salt. Cover and cook over medium heat until rice is very al dente and still crunchy, about 8 minutes; remove pan from heat.
Meanwhile, arrange eggplant on rimmed baking sheet, overlapping slightly. Drizzle 1/2 cup olive oil over; season with salt and pepper. Bake, turning eggplant halfway through, until tender and golden brown, 20–25 minutes.
Cover the bottom of a 13x9x2-inch baking dish with 1 cup tomato sauce. Sprinkle 1/3 of mozzarella over, then 1/3 of Parmesan.
Cover with a layer of eggplant rounds. Add saffron rice, spreading out in an even layer. Sprinkle over another 1/3 each of mozzarella and Parmesan, then 1/2 of the remaining tomato sauce and another layer of eggplant. Top with remaining tomato sauce and remaining mozzarella and Parmesan. Cover dish with foil.
Bake until sauce is bubbling and cheese is melted, about 15 minutes. Uncover dish and bake until golden on top, about 20 minutes longer. Let stand for at least 10 minutes to set before serving.
This looks gorgeous!
And it tastes even better than it looks ;-)
So glad you made it and liked it! We loved it too and I also halved the recipe; we still had four servings. Thanks for the shout out ;-)
Thanks for recommending!
Mmmm I love eggplant but don’t buy it unless I KNOW what I’m going to make with it. Otherwise it ends up in the compost!
Can I ask what marinara is? Is that the seafood mix? I didn’t see it mentioned in the method…
Marinara is just a thick tomato sauce. The recipe calls for a store-bought, jarred marinara, so that is why you didn’t see mention of it in the method. No seafood involved- at least in the marinara I purchase!
Enjoy!
Cool, thank you for that! I thought it might have been seafood because in Australia “marinara mix” is a seafood (prawn, calamari, salmon, muscle) mix. Funny! thanks!
Ooh! Looks delicious! But you really need to try that stuffed eggplant some time!
Don’t worry- it is the next dish I plan to make with the next eggplant I get! ;-)
This does look good!
I ended up making a baked Eggplant Parmesan. It ended up being not too time consuming, and it certainly was tasty!
Yummm!! Just made this last night, and altered the recipe with what I had. Didn’t have any white wine opened so I used a wheat appricot beer for basmati rice without saffron and let it cook a tad longer. Then used shredded swiss and cheddar. It was excellent, my husband was super impressed. ;)
So glad you enjoyed it! I don’t think it’s a big deal to leave the saffron out…honestly not even sure I could really taste it in the final dish, so I might save my precious threads for something else next time ;-)
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