Eggplant was something I always thought I didn’t like, even though I’d never actually had it before. I have no idea why that would mean I didn’t like it. It was just never something served in my house growing up. However, while at my friend Jill’s house about 7 years ago, her mother served up some eggplant parmesean and my world changed. Fried eggplant covered in tomato sauce, yes please!  Ethan then challeneged me to make my own version of it. Challenege accepted!  I read about how to work with eggplant and everything I saw talked about salting and rinsing the eggplant slices to make them less bitter. Now I realized why my mother never used eggplant, it seemed to be a lot of work.  But not to be discouraged, I set out to make my own eggplant parmesean. The kitchen counter was lined with pans of salted eggplant. When all was said and done, it was amazing. We had left overs for days. This became a go to recipe for company or special occasions. Served with some bread and a salad it was a great meal. Over time, I heard people saying that salting eggplant was really necessary. So I tried making it again without salting and it was just as good – better in fact as it didn’t take as long with the salting, rinsing and drying.

Fast forward a few years and Ethan and I were eating dinner at Sublime in Ft. Lauderdale. The menu had eggplant rollatini as an appetizer – rolled eggplant, filled with ricotta and fried. Of course I had to try them. One bite and I was hooked. Not only that, I knew I had to take my eggplant parmesean to a new level. Afterall, these were basically individual eggplant parmesean rolls. Ethan knew what I was thinking as soon as I tried them and even said, “you are going to make these now, aren’t you?” Well, yeah!

These can be an appetizer or an entree. As an appetizer, serve 2 or 3 per person, or just put out a platter of them and serve with the tomato sauce along side. For an entree, serve 3 or 4 per person and top with the sauce before serving.

Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 15 minutes
Servings: 6-8

Ingredients:

2 large eggplants, sliced lengthwise into ¼  inch slices
¼ cup olive oil
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 ½ cups tofu ricotta
1 TBL fresh basil, finely chopped
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups plain unsweetened nondairy milk
2 cups panko
Oil for frying
2 cups tomato sauce

Directions:

1. Heat a grill pan or grill over high heat. Brush eggplant slices with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste and grill 2 minutes per side, or until soft. Let them cool to room temperature.

Eggplant slices all grilled and ready to be filled and rolled

2. Combine the tofu ricotta and basil in a bowl.  Place 1 TBL of the ricotta mixture on the short end of each slice of eggplant. Roll the eggplant slices starting at the filled end to enclose the filling. The sides can be left open.

Rolled and ready for breading and frying

3. Place the flour, milk and panko in separate shallow pans.  Roll each eggplant roll in the flour to completely cover and shake off any excess.  Then dip into the milk letting the excess drip back into the pan. Then roll in the panko until evenly and completely coated. You might want to give each roll a gently squeeze to make sure the panko sticks.

4. Heat 1 inch of oil in a large pan to 350F. Fry the 5 or 6 rolls at a time for few minutes on one side until golden brown, flip and fry on the other side until golden brown. Remove from the oil, place on paper towel to drain and sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.  Repeat with remaining rolls.

5. To serve place 3 rollatini on a plate and top with a spoonful of tomato sauce. Serve any remaining sauce on the side.