If you make pasta with Pecorino and black pepper and call it “pasta with Pecorino and black pepper,” you won’t get into trouble on the internet for making an incorrect cacio e pepe. So it’s in that same spirit that I present to you an eggplant and tomato pasta with mozzarella that’s definitely not Pasta alla Norma.
Pasta alla Norma is traditionally made by frying eggplant in oil, adding it to a tomato sauce, and then finishing with shavings of ricotta salata.
For this particular pasta, I roasted the eggplant in the oven which has two main advantages: (1) you can get it browner with less oil; (2) there’s less to clean up.
Meanwhile I made a tomato sauce with fresh summery tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, and red onion just because I had it (also not traditional in a Norma sauce). I added the eggplant to the tomato sauce, let it simmer, and once I dropped the pasta in to boiling water, I added a ladleful of it to the tomato/eggplant pot to make it saucier. When the pasta was just about al dente, I added it to the pot and cooked it all together so the pasta could soak up the sauce.
You may notice some white bits in there; that’s because instead of ricotta salata, I added bocconcini (little white balls of mozzarella) and stirred them in so they melted a bit. I also added fresh basil and Aleppo pepper (a bit milder than traditional peperoncino). Craig put grated Parmesan all over his, that’s how rule-breaky we are.
But you’re not breaking any rules, as long as you don’t call this Norma. It’s Eggplant and Tomato Pasta with Mozzarella and you can make it any way you like it.
Eggplant and Tomato Pasta with Mozzarella
Ingredients
Method
- Preheat the oven to 450.
- Add the eggplant to a cookie sheet and drizzle with the olive oil; toss. If some of the pieces still look dry, add a little more oil. Sprinkle with salt, toss again, and roast in the oven for 15 minutes undisturbed. When you take it out, you should be able to detach a piece of eggplant without tearing the skin: that's how you know it's time to flip. Flip the eggplant and keep roasting until golden brown all over, at least another 10 minutes. Set aside.
- In the meantime, pour a few tablespoons of olive oil into a large Dutch oven. Heat on medium heat and add the red onion with a pinch of salt. Sauté until starting to turn translucent, then add the garlic and continue to cook until fragrant. Add all of the tomatoes, another pinch of salt, some basil, and cook on medium heat just until the tomatoes begin to break down and release their juices. Then add the eggplant and cook on a low simmer.
- Bring a pot of water to a boil and season with salt. Add the pasta and cook one minute less than package directions. If the tomato/eggplant looks dry, add a ladleful of the pasta water. When the pasta's ready, lift it with a spider tool into the pot with the eggplant and tomatoes. Crank up the heat and stir everything together until the pasta has absorbed the sauce and the bottom of the pot is relatively dry.
- Turn off the heat and after a minute add the mozzarella balls, stirring them in. Let them sit for another minute so they start to melt. Stir again and ladle into pasta bowls and garnish with more basil and Aleppo pepper.
