Vegan Eggplant Lasagna!
All I can say is YUM. I was just making lunch and thought I might make some eggplant pizzas, but I just had SO MUCH cauliflower pizza over Superbowl weekend that I needed a twist on it! This is baking in the oven as I write this out but I wanted to make sure I remembered exactly how I put this together so you guys can make it too!
As usual, my recipe was born just out of food I have in my fridge, no planning or grocery shopping other than my main food theme in life, which is:
Keep everything on hand all the time. Mostly produce 🍐🥗🍝🥦🥬
Vegan parmesean is like our new best friend around here, mostly Heath’s, I have to hide it from him so he doesn’t eat it before I can make my recipes! Everything is mainstream in this recipe, the eggplant and vegan parm are probably the two ‘different’ type things you might need to start buying if you aren’t used to cooking with them.
INGREDIENTS
1/3 - 1/4 jar of organic marinara sauce
3 cans organic diced tomatoes, strain liquid
2 small organic eggplant (I used almost all of the second)
1 package of fresh sliced mushrooms
1/3 thinly sliced white onion
1/4 cup hemp seeds
Vegan parmesean
1 small can tomato paste
Fresh basil
Dried oregano
Dried garlic powder
Dried parsley
Olive oil spray
Himalayan sea salt
DIRECTIONS
Heat the oven to 375 F
Wash eggplant and slice thinly (about 1/3 inch thick), cut off ends
Spray 9x13 pan (cake pan) with olive oil
Layer the eggplant to cover the bottom, I had to slice some of the slices into smaller/thinner shapes so it would fit exactly, then spray eggplant with olive oil spray and season with all dried herbs, salt
On your stovetop, spray pan with olive oil, heat to medium low heat and when hot, add sliced onions (they won’t cook at the same rate in the oven and will be raw otherwise. Stir often until softened.
Next, layer sliced mushrooms, then sauteed onions and spray and season this layer again.
Use a cheese grater and do a fine layer of parmesean over the veggies, sprinkle hemp seeds on top.
Add 2 cans of diced tomatoes and spread over veggies, then additional red sauce to your liking. Also, mix in a bowl the marinara (strain out excess water) with tomato paste to thicken up sauce (you can use the entire small can if you like, or if you have the tube kind, just as much as you need to thicken the red sauce).
Wash fresh basil, roll up and then chiffonade into ribbons and layer on top
Repeat all layers.
Once you get to the top, add a little more red sauce, and a few chunks of the parmesean along with more freshly grated cheese on top.
Bake in the oven for about 35-40 minutes, depending on your oven, let cool and then slice and serve!
NOTES:
The vegan parm doesn’t exactly melt sooooo well, but it’s a great flavor addition and mostly importantly, it’s #dairyfree meaning it’s saving our digestion from much anguish :)
You could also add layers of zucchini or yellow squash if you don’t have all that much eggplant, or try gluten free lasagna noodles
Let me know if you try this, or put your own spin on it!