While I am not vegan, when my friend came to visit a few months ago, I decided to make her lunch and settled on one of our favorites: eggplant parmesan. The best part is that it was only slightly more complicated to make vegan eggplant parm than it is to make the traditional version, and the added complication comes mainly from a few extra ingredients.
What you need:
-1-2 eggplants (better if they are on the narrow side)
-1/2 cup flour
-1 cup breadcrumbs
-vegan Parmesan cheese to taste
-1 tsp dried oregano
-a pinch of salt
-1 cup unsweetened plain almond milk
-1 tbsp corn starch
-pasta
-pasta sauce
What you do:
1. Slice the eggplant into thin rounds and sprinkle both sides with salt. Arrange in a colander and let sit in the sit for 15 minutes to draw out the eggplant’s bitter taste.
2. Rinse and dry, then place on a kitchen towel (or a thick layer of paper towels). Cover with another dish towel (or more paper towels) and then lay a baking sheet with something heavy on top of it and let sit for at least 10 minutes to dry.
3. While the eggplant is drying, heat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit (205 degrees Celsius) and line a baking sheet with foil and a little bit of oil. At this point you can also start to boil the water for the pasta.
4. Next, the dipping stations need to be prepped. In the first bowl, put the almond and corn starch and mix. The flour goes in the second bowl, and the breadcrumbs, oregano, salt, and parmesan cheese go in the third.
5. Once the eggplant is dry, dip each slice into the three bowls: almond milk, then flour, then breadcrumbs. Arrange on the baking sheet and pop into the oven for 20-30 minutes.
6. While the eggplant is baking, heat oil in a pan and pull the eggplant slices out of the oven, 3-4 at a time. Fry for two minutes or until browned, then put back into the oven to finish baking. What I did was: at about 15 minutes, I started pulling out the eggplant slices, so that by the time I finished frying them, the baking time was just about done.
7. Drain pasta and heat pasta sauce.
8. Enjoy!
This whole process took me about 1.5 hours, but I’m sure that the more you do it, the quicker and easier it becomes.
Thank you to the Minimalist Baker for this recipe, although I modified a bit for my own purposes. 😉