Okay travel blog, it's identity crisis time, because today I made petite eggplant lasagnas for dinner and thus for the day you are becoming a food blog! The inspiration for my petite lasagnas came from the real food blog Can You Stay for Dinner, where they served petite lasagnas made in muffin tins with wanton wrappers. Being that I live in Europe, I have no muffin tins, so I did a little research and confirmed on a Garden Web forum that you can use coffee mugs for baking in. I also didn't have any wanton wrappers on hand, so I used leftover lasagna noodles from my last full sized lasagna. Since I also had a great deal of eggplant that needed using I decided to take my father's lasagna recipe and eggplantitize it!
I very slightly adapted a recipe for an eggplant sauce, which I found on EggplantRecipes.net and went ahead and cooked that first while I cooked the lasagna noodles.
Eggplant Sauce
Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1-1/2 eggplants, peeled and cubed
5 medium tomatoes, boiled and skinned (I don't deseed, but you can), then chopped
1 tsp tomato paste
1/4 cup dry red wine
1 tsp basil (I used dry, but the recipe calls for 2 tbsp fresh)
1 tsp orageno (I used dry, but the recipe calls for 2 tbsp fresh)
1/2 tsp parsley
S&P to taste
1. Heat olive oil in large saucepan over medium heat
2. Add onion and garlic. Saute until onion is tender
3. Stir in eggplant and tomatoes and let simmer for 2-3 minutes
4. Add the red wine, basil, orageno, parsley, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Stir in the tomato paste.
5. Reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer for about half an hour. I then crushed the sauce with a wooden spoon to make a smoother consistency for the lasagna.
For the Petite Lasagna themselves, I used an altered version of my father's normal lasagna recipe.
Petite Eggplant Lasagna
Makes 3-4 petite lasagnas (depending on the size of your mugs)
Ingredients:
1 to 1-1/2 cups of ricotta
S&P to taste
4 lasagna noodles, cooked (mine were short, only about 6 inches long, so I got two circles that fit my mugs out of each)
1 ball of mozzarella cheese, sliced in circles to fit the size of the mug and thickness of a lasagna noodle (or if you don't live in Europe, about 1 cup shredded mozzarella)
4 lasagna noodles, cooked (mine were short, only about 6 inches long, so I got two circles that fit my mugs out of each)
1 ball of mozzarella cheese, sliced in circles to fit the size of the mug and thickness of a lasagna noodle (or if you don't live in Europe, about 1 cup shredded mozzarella)
Grated parmesean cheese to top
Eggplant Sauce (see above)
1/2 eggplant, sliced in circles to fit the size of the mug and thickness of a lasagna noodle
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Mix the nutmeg into the ricotta and add salt and pepper to taste.
3. Cut lasagna noodles to fit the size of your mug. I also made one where I layer the lasagna noodle like in the
4. Layer eggplant sauce, lasagna noodle, ricotta mixture, eggplant sauce, mozzarella, and slice of eggplant two times or until you fill your mug.
5. Sprikle the top with shredded parmesean.
6. Bake at 350 for about an hour or cover and them them in the freezer to chill until you need them!
Eggplant Sauce (see above)
1/2 eggplant, sliced in circles to fit the size of the mug and thickness of a lasagna noodle
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Mix the nutmeg into the ricotta and add salt and pepper to taste.
3. Cut lasagna noodles to fit the size of your mug. I also made one where I layer the lasagna noodle like in the
4. Layer eggplant sauce, lasagna noodle, ricotta mixture, eggplant sauce, mozzarella, and slice of eggplant two times or until you fill your mug.
5. Sprikle the top with shredded parmesean.
6. Bake at 350 for about an hour or cover and them them in the freezer to chill until you need them!
Mahlzeit!!!
