In my visit to Sicily I stumbled upon this dish that was so incredibly delicious.
I do not remember the name they had it in the restaurant, but I tried to search it online and I found this recipe that I think recreates it perfectly, except the pistachio pesto on the top.
Of course they use a specific type of pasta that I don’t have (maccaruna) and cheese (ricotta salata), but I replaced them with spaghetti nr. 1 and mozzarella.
Sicilian involtini
Preparation time: 45 min
Baking time: 20 min
Baking temperature: 175 C
Servings: 4
Difficulty: easy to medium
Ingredients
- 1 eggplant
- salt for the eggplant
- 5 tablespoons of oil for the eggplant
- 70 grams of spaghetti (or maccaruna)
- 1 can of tomatoes
- 1 onion
- 1 garlic clove
- chili flakes (optional)
- basil
- olive oil for frying
- salt and pepper
- mozzarella for the top (or ricotta salata)
Directions
- Cut the eggplant into long thin 0.5 cm slices. Leave the skin on the eggplant.
- Salt them very well, cover them with water in a bowl and let them there for an hour.
- Rinse them after and hour and pat them dry.
- I think the one I ate in Sicily had the eggplant deep fried, but I only fried them in a bit of oil on both slides in a pan until they got a bit soft.
- For the sauce: fry the finely diced onion in olive oil until it is very soft, then add the garlic for a few seconds.
- Add the tomato can in and press on the tomatoes to make a fine sauce.
- Cook for 30 min and at the end season with basil, chili flakes, salt and pepper.
- Boil your pasta aldente and add it in the tomato sauce with a bit of the pasta water and mix well.
- Now it is time to assemble:add a bit of tomato sauce (without spaghetti) at the botton of your pan.
- Wrap a bit of spaghetti in a slice of fried eggplant and place seam side down in the baking dish.
- Add on top of the rolls the remaining tomato sauce.
- You can optionally add pistachio pesto if you have it.
- Cover with cheese, can be mozzarella, parmesan or, traditionally, ricotta salata.
- Bake at 175 C for 20 min.
- It looks beautiful and it taste very good, the combination is refreshing and soft.
