Baked Breaded Eggplant with Marinara

Baked Breaded Eggplant with Marinara

The ingredients and instructions might look daunting, but it's really easy to make! As long as you can slide, dredge, dunk, and spray, you'll be able to make this. I usually enjoy this as the 'main course' of the meal, and two stacks of three eggplant slices are plenty filling for me. This could also be a side dish, too. Enjoy!

Ingredients
1 large eggplant  (or 2 medium eggplants)
1 c. egg substitute (or 2-3 eggs)
1 tsp. oregano
1 tsp. basil
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. black pepper
2 c. crumbs
2 c. Parmesan cheese
2 c. mozzarella cheese
2 c. marinara sauce (or any other tomato/pasta sauce)

*For breadcrumbs, I use whatever I have on hand and pulverize it using a food processor.  Sometimes I'll make breadcrumbs from toast in the food processor.  This time, I used a combination of leftover Cheerios, Club crackers, and graham crackers which were left over from this recipe.

Preparation
Heat the oven to 400* F. Coat a baking sheet with cooking spray.

Instructions

1. Wash the eggplant, trim the ends off, and cut into 1/2 inch thick slices.
2. Whisk together the egg, oregano, basil, garlic powder, black pepper, and 1 c. of Parmesan cheese in a shallow dish.
3. Dredge each eggplant slice through the egg mixture (making sure it is entirely coated) and then through the crumbs, pressing down to make sure the crumbs get all over every part of the slice.  Place on the baking sheet.
4. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until all the slices have been coated with crumbs. Spray the top sides of the eggplant slices with a coat of cooking spray.
5. Bake for 20 minutes then flip the slices over. Coat the new "top" sides with a layer of cooking spray and bake for 20 more minutes.
6. Take the baking sheets out of the oven. Sprinkle the remaining Parmesan on each slice and bake for two more minutes, or until the cheese melts.
7. To serve, put one eggplant slice on a plate, top with marinara, and add mozzarella. Repeat the process with two more slices stacked on top of the first slice.  

Egg mixture, crumbs, and a happy eggplant

ready to go!

baking in the oven

prepared and ready to enjoy. yum!

I used two eggplants, which made plenty of leftovers for just the Mr. and I. I store the eggplant slices just as they are straight out of the oven. Don't put the marinara and mozzarella on until right before you serve it. It seems to keep it's freshness best if the leftovers are made that way, instead of assembled and then stored.

Also, I tried to put this recipe up on this website so that it could be formatted better, but I'm not sure if I have the hang of posting recipes yet. If anyone has any tips on how to get Google's recipe search to integrate with recipes on blogger, I'd be more than happy to hear how that works!