This roasted eggplant is made with rosemary and olive oil for the best tasting roasted eggplant ever. An ideal side or appetizer.
The other week my sister and brother-in-law got a sitter for their kids and came over to cook us dinner, at our place.
It was quite a treat! They made the main course and we supplied the dessert. Honestly as a food blogger this was no trouble, I had like 3 different kinds of desserts on hand.
Anyway, one of the things they cooked for us was roasted eggplant.
Now if you’ve spent any time as a vegetarian or vegan, then you have probably been served some oily eggplant at a fair few events. In fact this is often the go-to thing to serve vegans/vegetarians when various non-vegan chefs have no idea what else to serve. But this eggplant is different.
I can tell you that I had never had roasted eggplant quite this good!
This roasted eggplant is made with minimal oil, it’s infused with rosemary and roasted to absolute perfection. It will seriously be the best roasted eggplant you’ve ever tasted too! You’ll also love our roasted garlic recipe.
How To Make Roasted Eggplant
You will find full instructions and measurements in the recipe card at the bottom of the post. This is a summary of the process to go along with the process photos.
So it’s really easy, you just take 2 eggplants and cut them in half. Then you take a knife and cut deep diagonal lines from one side to the other and diagonal lines the other way so that they intersect each other.
Then you sprinkle salt all over the tops, and squeeze them on each side to open up the diagonal grooves and get some salt down there as well. Then you let them sit (face up) for 30 minutes for that salt to draw out some excess moisture and any bitterness from the eggplant.
After 30 minutes, you squeeze off the excess water, blot any excess salt off the tops with a paper towel (just a light blotting, no need to try and wipe salt off, some saltiness is good!)
Then you brush with olive oil and sprinkle with dried rosemary.
Transfer to a parchment lined baking tray and bake (upside down) for around an hour.
The eggplants will collapse as you see above when they are cooked.
Then you take them out of the oven, and let them cool for around 20 minutes before flipping them over with a spatula and serving!
The cubes of roasted eggplant are perfectly roasted and ready to be grabbed with a fork.
This makes an ideal appetizer or side dish.
Choose Good Eggplants
Just a word of warning about eggplants though. Sometimes even putting salt on and letting them sit for 30 minutes doesn’t draw out all the bitterness. The trick is in getting really fresh good eggplant to start off with. Older, less fresh eggplant tend to be more bitter.
The very large eggplant are also more likely to be bitter than smaller ones.
A little bitterness is no train smash though! It’s usually still delicious, because the other flavors (from the saltiness and dried rosemary), counteract any remaining bitterness that they might have.
The ones you see pictured before you were simply delicious, perfectly roasted with the perfect blend of flavors from the eggplant, olive oil, salt and rosemary – not a hint of any bitterness (and they were very large eggplants too).
More Delicious Eggplant Recipes
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Roasted Eggplant (Aubergine)
Instructions
- Slice the eggplants in half and then take a knife and cut deep diagonal lines from one side to the other and then cut diagonal lines the other way so they intersect each other.
- Sprinkle with salt all over the tops and squeeze the eggplants on either side to open up the diagonal grooves and get some salt into the grooves as well. Don't use a huge amount of salt, around 1 teaspoon in total is enough.
- Leave the eggplants lying face up for 30 minutes, allowing the salt to draw excess moisture and bitterness out.
- After 30 minutes, squeeze off the excess water and blot with a paper towel to remove excess salt.
- Brush with olive oil and sprinkle with dried rosemary and then place face down on a parchment lined baking tray.
- Bake in the oven for around 60 minutes at 400°F (200°C).
- When the eggplants look sort of collapsed, then they are ready.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool for around 15-20 minutes before using a spatula to flip them over and serve with an extra sprinkle of dried rosemary.
Second time I’ve made this recipe and hands down the best easiest eggplant recipe ever. Shared with all my eggplant loving family and friends. See endless possibilities too, threw some sauce and cheese on for a easy parmesan flavor, some feta and sun-dried tomato for greek, add a pasta or doodle side and it’s dinner. Thanks for sharing.
Yay, love all those ideas for the recipe! Thanks for sharing!
Scrumptious! I’m a celiac and was happy to find an eggplant recipe without breading. I have made this several times and the only change I recommend is to use fresh rosemary if you have it. Start to finish, this takes about 2 hours, including the 15-20 min rest period (don’t skip it).
Awesome, thanks for sharing Vicki!