If you’ve been following us on Instagram, you know our garden has not been great this year. But, a few years ago, we grew at least 30 eggplants in our garden. So I spent that year coming up with a lot of new garden eggplant recipes, like this Eggplant Parmesan Pasta recipe.
It has all the flavors of eggplant parmesan without the battering and frying. And yes, fried eggplant makes eggplant parmesan so delicious, but it also makes eggplant parmesan a special occasion dinner. Because of its ease, this Eggplant Parmesan Pasta recipe is a simple weeknight dinner.
You can make it with garden eggplant, of course, but if you’re not growing eggplant in your garden, store bought eggplant works just as well.
Eggplant Parmesan Pasta Recipe
For this recipe, you can use a large eggplant (most of the eggplants you’ll find in stores are called globe or American eggplants) or three garden grown Indian eggplants. Indian eggplants are commonly grown at home because they can be quickly harvested due to their traditionally small size. They’re spherical and usually grow to be the size of baseballs. Because they’re smaller than a store-bought eggplant, you’ll need to use more of them in this recipe.
Eggplant Parmesan Pasta Ingredients:
- 1 large eggplant or three garden grown Indian eggplants
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 12 oz. box of bow tie pasta
- 24 oz. marinara sauce
- 8 oz. mozzarella cheese
- 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
- 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
How To Make Eggplant Parmesan Pasta:
Peel the eggplant. Dice it into bite-sized chunks.
Put the eggplant chunks into a bowl of water with 1 teaspoon salt. Let the eggplant sit at least 30 minutes (two hours is best, if you have the time).
The salted water will pull out any bitterness in the eggplant, leaving the sweetness behind. The longer you can soak the eggplant, the more bitterness will pull out. So the longer you can soak it, the better. I recommend soaking it for at least 30 minutes.
While it’s soaking, pre-heat the oven to 425 F.
Drain the eggplant and squeeze out any excess water. Pat the eggplant dry.
Place the eggplant on a silicone baking mat-lined baking pan (If you don’t have a baking mat, you can use foil).
Drizzle with olive oil, salt, and garlic powder. Stir the eggplant to make sure each piece is coated.
Bake the eggplant for 25 minutes until it’s fork tender.
Boil your pasta according to the package and drain it.
Put a very thin layer of marinara sauce at the bottom of a 11×13-inch pan.
Pour the pasta into the pan.
Add the cooked eggplant to the pan.
Shred the mozzarella cheese.
Add half of the mozzarella cheese to the pan.
Pour in the rest of the jar of marinara sauce.
Add half the Italian seasoning and stir until combined.
Top with the remaining mozzarella cheese, the parmesan cheese, and the rest of the Italian seasoning.
Cover in foil and bake for 30 minutes.
Serve warm.
Eggplant Parmesan Pasta: Frequently Asked Questions
I make Eggplant Parmesan Pasta with bow tie pasta because the flat size makes it easy to get a piece of pasta and eggplant in one bite. The cheese also adheres to bow tie pasta really well.
A ziti pasta would be good in this too, but for me, it feels too much like baked ziti that way. And I like baked ziti, but the bow tie pasta in this recipe makes it something a little different.
But, honestly, whatever you have on hand will work. If all you is spaghetti, you can use that too. It will change the look of the dish, but since all the elements are there, you’ll still get the same taste no matter what pasta you use.
The shredded cheese that comes bagged is convenient. It’s already shredded for you, so that takes a little work away from you. So I understand why people buy it.
But from a taste standpoint, it’s not that great.
Shredded cheese has preservatives in it to keep the cheese from clumping together in the bag. Those same preservatives prevent the cheese from really melting, though. And in a recipe like this Eggplant Parmesan Pasta, where melted cheese is part of its appeal, pre-shredded cheese isn’t ideal.
As long as you have a good cheese grater, shredding a block of mozzarella cheese is a really quick task. And it makes such a difference in your recipes that you’ll start shredding your own cheese all the time.
What to serve with Eggplant Parmesan Pasta:
A simple side salad goes best with this Eggplant Parmesan Pasta. Our Garden Tomato Salad is a great side dish for this recipe too.
A nice crispy bread or garlic bread is a good compliment to this recipe as well.
Other Eggplant Parmesan Recipes:
If you’re looking for more eggplant parm recipes, we have those too. We have a traditional, a baked, and a complete twist on the recipe too.
Traditional Eggplant Parmesan
This Eggplant Parmesan is made in the traditional way. The eggplant is dredged in flour, then coated in egg, and finished in breadcrumbs.
Each piece of eggplant is fried to golden brown, then layered between cheese and sauce. It’s baked to perfection.
Baked Eggplant Parmesan
This Baked Eggplant Parmesan recipe is more popular than our Traditional Eggplant Parmesan recipe, mostly because it omits the most labor intensive portion of eggplant parmesan: the frying.
With this recipe, you still need to coat the eggplant slices in flour, egg, and breadcrumbs. But you don’t pan fry each piece.
The only way the eggplant cooks in this recipe is in the oven, so you do need to keep it in the oven longer than you do when you fry the eggplant, but that’s all hands off time.
Breaded Eggplant Parmesan Bites
If you want to serve eggplant parmesan as a snack, these Breaded Eggplant Parmesan Bites are great.
Cut the eggplant into bite-sized pieces, coat them in egg and breadcrumbs (no flour for this recipe), sprinkle Parmesan cheese on them, and bake. Serve them with a side dish of marinara sauce.
Eggplant Parmesan Pasta
Eggplant Parmesan Pasta has all the flavors of eggplant parmesan without any of the breading and frying.
Ingredients
- 1 large eggplant or three garden grown Indian eggplants
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 12 oz. box of bow tie pasta
- 24 oz. marinara sauce
- 8 oz. mozzarella cheese
- 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
- 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
Instructions
- Peel the eggplant. Dice it into bite-sized chunks. Put the eggplant chunks into a bowl of water with 1 teaspoon salt. Let the eggplant sit at least 30 minutes.
- While it’s soaking, pre-heat the oven to 425 F.
- Drain the eggplant and squeeze out any excess water. Pat the eggplant dry. Place the eggplant on a silicone baking mat-lined baking pan (If you don’t have a baking mat, you can use foil).
- Drizzle with olive oil, salt, and garlic powder. Stir the eggplant to make sure each piece is coated. Bake the eggplant for 25 minutes until it’s fork tender.
- Boil your pasta according to the package and drain it.
- Put a very thin layer of marinara sauce at the bottom of a 11×13-inch pan.
- Pour the pasta into the pan.
- Add the cooked eggplant to the pan.
- Shred the mozzarella cheese and add half of it to the pan.
- Pour in the rest of the jar of marinara sauce.
- Add half the Italian seasoning and stir until combined.
- Top with the remaining mozzarella cheese, the parmesan cheese, and the rest of the Italian seasoning.
- Cover in foil and bake for 30 minutes. Serve warm.
Nutrition Information
Yield
6Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 402Total Fat 17gSaturated Fat 7gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 9gCholesterol 36mgSodium 1245mgCarbohydrates 47gFiber 9gSugar 14gProtein 17g
Have you tried this Eggplant Parmesan Pasta recipe? Let us know what you thought in the comments.