Last week I was curious to try out a Giada De Laurentiis recipe for Eggplant Rollatini, but it just wasn't in the cards with the schedule that Steph and I had. Sunday however, was a totally different story but taking a look at the recipe, 3 eggplants was WAAAY to much Kicking off cookin' I decided that it was best to start with the marinara sauce.

One trick I picked up from Molto Mario was to slice up the garlic instead of just choppin' it up. Slicing it fairly thin, frankly is just pretty dang fun as opposed to sending it through the garlic press Sauteing up the mirepoix started making the house smell super yummers.

I threw in some red pepper flakes (yes, how crazy am I going off the recipe and adding my own dash?!?!?). I threw in some crushed red tomatoes and let it start simmerin' for an hour. It was about this time that I got some unexpected help….my wonderful wife had taken over the kitchen to make some cookies and it was then she offered up some help! Hoo-RAH! Steph had already started slicing up some of the eggplant…I hadn't even thought of it…but she was using the mandolin!

Action SHOT!! lol The slices were super thin and uniformly the same size as I laid them out to be salted on a baking tray to sweat out the bitterness. It sounds super geeky but I do love watching the moisture come to the surface. Steph laughed at me watching the eggplant and called me "Science Boy" hehe…maybe so, but it was still fun.

After about 20 minutes, I took the sweated eggplants and washed off the salt and residual moisture leaving me with some yummy, sweet eggplants…ready for some EVOO and subsequent grilling in the grill pan.

Steph was working making the filling as I snuck in with a little fresh nutmeg as I love nutmeg with ricotta cheese. Grilling up the eggplant Steph started assembling the stuffed eggplant.

Rolling up these little guys we made sure to put the seams side down so that they wouldn't leak out as we cooked them.

While Steph finished up rolling up the eggplant, I put the sauce in the blender to smooth it out and I have to say it came out pretty damn good. It didn't really need any additional seasoning as I covered the eggplant with sauce and some additional parmesan. The final product was met with rave reviews from Steph. We finished off the plating with some garlic spinach for a green vegetable.

Lessons Learned: This was the first time I've felt that Steph and I worked together in the kitchen fairly well. Working together made the job move a heck of a lot faster. Also, I have to say that the mandolin worked super well. I would've never thought of that as I seem to be married to my knives at times…lesson well taken for slicing objects in a uniform pattern at a fast pace. Also, it didn't take much to put together a fairly easy, tasty marinara sauce

FINISHED!!