I picked up some eggplant from Elm Street Gardens' booth at the MorningSide Farmers Market without a fate for the plump purple veggies in mind. As I rode the train home I thought about an easy-to-prepare dish that contained the items I had in my fridge or that I had picked up from the market. I had a few organic hybrid tomatoes, fresh garlic, shishito peppers, fresh basil, and a little cilantro from my local grocery store.

I didn’t have time to grab tomato paste from the store on the way home. So I did what anyone would do with more tomatoes than they could ever possibly eat in a week: I made a sauce for my eggplant parmesan.

According to a few recipes and my own tried and true methods, eggplant parm is a simple yet elegant dish that consists of olive oil, eggplant, tomato sauce, breadcrumbs, and parmesan cheese layered atop one another like a pasta-free lasagna.

I began by preheating the oven to 300 degrees. I wasn’t worried about softening my eggplant. I wanted full flavor and slight crunch topped with sauce and cheese.

While the oven heated, I prepared ingredients for my first timer’s tomato sauce:

Diced Tomato

Grated Shishito Peppers

Diced Garlic + Shredded Cilantro

Torn Basil Leaves + Corn Syrup (substitute honey, sugar, brown sugar, or skip altogether)

Breadcrumbs

(Skip this if you bought breadcrumbs from the store)

Once all of that was ready, using my clean, dry blender I grabbed some whole wheat bread that a roommate had long-since forgotten from the fridge. I inspected the aged bread for mold. Seeing none, I proceeded to rip the bread into chunks into my blender. I then seasoned the bread with black pepper, a pinch of salt, a fourth of a tablespoon of garlic powder, and a tablespoon and a half or Italian seasoning (usually oregano, dry basil, parsley, etc…)

Then, I blended and shook my bread pieces into a breadcrumb powder. Some people toast their breadcrumbs, so feel free to toast yours. I skipped the toasting since I still had a sauce to prepare.

Return of the Sauce

Add a fourth of a cup of boiling hot water or just a few tablespoons. Salt in the hot water is optional. (It all depends on how you want your sauce to taste.) Place shredded peppers, garlic, cilantro, and basil into blender and blend until in a light, chunky paste.

Now, add your tomato. I used one red-green heirloom tomato, and three organic hybrid tomatoes that were small. That wasn’t enough tomato for me, so I grabbed a few cherry sungold tomatoes to balance things out. I blended until there were no chunks at all.

Placing the mixture into a pot, I simmered the paste into a sauce for 40 minutes. I added a tablespoon of corn starch to a fourth of a cup of cold water, then slowly stirred in the cornstarch to thicken my sauce.

While my sauce simmered on low heat for 40 minutes. I diced my eggplant into thin slices and coated them in olive oil.

Once my sauce was finished I layered it in atop my eggplant. Then I sprinkled breadcrumbs on the sauce and eggplant, followed by a sprinkle of parmesan cheese. I made another layer on that first then popped it into the oven for 45 minutes. I could have let it cook longer but I wasn’t concerned about softening my eggplant. You could sauté or boil your eggplant prior to baking in with cheese and sauce if you want a tender eggplant.

The rest of my meal consisted of some great organic long beans I boiled with fresh onion and fresh organic garlic.

Some organic corn, boiled. It was so good, no butter or salt necessary.

A bit of baked hamburger patties with onion, garlic, and shishito peppers.

If you try this recipe I do hope that you enjoy it as much as I did. To purchase all products used in this recipe directly from the farmers that grow them please visit the MorningSide Farmers Market any Saturday from 8am-11:30am http://www.morningsidemarket.com/

Most of the ingredients used in this recipe come from Elm Street Gardens located in Sparta, GA. To obtain a CSA with this farm please visit their website http://elmstreetgardens.com/csasignup/