Lasagna and Eggplant Parm Had a Child, and It Is Superb

There is a temporary interval yearly when many of the summer time’s finest produce overlaps with a lot of what’s to return within the fall and winter. Piles of purple tomatoes sit alongside mounds of contemporary, crisp apples, and laborious winter squash mingle with bell peppers and eggplant. I would not need to ever have to choose my one favourite time of the yr—all of them have their place—but when I needed to, it might be laborious to not single out this quick but plentiful shoulder-season as probably the most superb.

That is additionally a time of yr when temperatures drop and cravings for extra comforting, filling meals hit. On this second, I can not consider a greater dish to make than lasagna alla Norma, which is an al forno (“baked”) spin on the famous Sicilian pasta that includes summertime stars like eggplant and tomatoes together with contemporary dairy reminiscent of ricotta or mozzarella (some recipes for this lasagna use one, some the opposite—I take advantage of each). It is the proper method to make the most of the final of summer time’s produce in a manner that feels suited to the autumn.

Whereas this recipe is usually often called lasagna alla Norma (or lasagna alla Catanese, after town of Catania the place alla Norma is claimed to originate), I discover it simply as helpful to consider it as a mashup between eggplant Parmigiana and lasagna, given its alternating layers of fried eggplant, tomato sauce, cheese, and pasta. On a technical stage, this Parmigiana mindset is extra helpful in figuring out the easiest way to make the dish.

Once I was working years in the past on my recipe for Italian-style eggplant parm (melanzane alla Parmigiana), I made it the best way I would discovered to make it much more years in the past whereas engaged on farms in Italy: I sliced contemporary summer time eggplant, fried it in oil, then layered it with contemporary mozzarella, and a easy contemporary tomato sauce. It is my most well-liked method to make it, far more than the breaded Italian-American model—the result’s silky and aromatic, not heavy with breading.

However over time, some feedback popped up on the recipe complaining a couple of watery outcome. This stumped me—it’d by no means occurred to me earlier than, not on the farm, and never again at dwelling in New York. Ultimately I noticed sufficient feedback of this kind that I revisited my recipe and in addition had it cross-tested by one in every of my take a look at kitchen colleagues (she reported nice outcomes). Ultimately, I up to date the recipe barely with some small technical changes to assist scale back potential wetness, all of which I am making use of to this recipe as effectively. They’re:

• Salt the eggplant. My lifelong expertise is that almost all in-season eggplant doesn’t must be salted. It is not bitter, which is commonly given as the explanation to salt, and I haven’t got any points with the way it cooks when unsalted. However even a quick salting does pull out a number of the eggplant’s water, and if wetness was a difficulty for some cooks at dwelling, it appeared like a logical step so as to add to my parmigiana recipe, and to this one. Consider it as an insurance coverage coverage in opposition to undesirable wetness.
• Drain effectively after frying. This was a step in my unique recipe for the parm, however I rewrote the directions to emphasise how essential it’s to blot the fried eggplant slices effectively to take away extra oil. Oil is not water, after all, however an abundance of it might in concept give the impression of a too-wet dish.
• Keep away from skinny tomato sauce. This too was much less a technical change to my recipe and extra a rephrasing of what was already there, stressing extra clearly the significance of utilizing a sauce that’s not too skinny and watery. It would not should be thick like tomato paste by any means, however you desire a sauce that, whereas contemporary and vivid and fruity, can also be thick with the fruit’s pure fiber, very like a superb apple sauce.
• Blot the mozz. I strongly favor actual, contemporary mozzarella to the low-moisture stuff, although it is not pretty much as good of a melter and might launch water when it does soften. It has a clear, milky taste that comes by within the ultimate dish and considerably improves it, making it miles higher than any of the low-moisture mozzarella cheeses that normally get beneficial in these sorts of recipes. So, what to do about that wateriness? Easy: I simply seize a clear kitchen towel and blot the cheese effectively to absorb extra water. That appears to do the trick.

With the entire above changes, I am assured my melanzane alla Parmigiana recipe won’t come out watery for anybody, and I can say the identical for this lasagna, which makes use of all the identical strategies, simply with some pasta layered in for good measure.

The result’s incredible, with flavors and textures that strike as each summery and autumnal on the similar time. Although, for all my speak concerning the seasons, I will be trustworthy: I would fortunately eat this any time of yr.