Roasted Eggplant Pasta Bake with Spinach
This baked pasta with quick-roasted eggplant and spinach is such an easy, family-friendly vegetarian dinner that’s done baking in just 35 minutes. The eggplant tucks in with the pasta, red sauce (I love to use my homemade pasta sauce, but your favorite jarred one will work too!) and melty cheese….bringing everything together into a veggie-loaded, comfort-food dinner situation.
I’m going to be honest…eggplant isn’t the vegetable I’m reaching for first at the grocery store. Never has been. Never will be. Weird intro for a eggplant recipe, right? But hold tight. Because this is more me telling you that I am NOT and eggplant advocate, but still think you will kinda love this eggplant pasta bake…because I def do…as a big eggplant-iffy gal. Because, you see, over the years I’ve learned that the problem was never really the eggplant….it was how I was cooking it. Back when we belonged to a CSA, eggplants kept showing up in our weekly box and I not about to let them go directly go to the compost pile (while it was tempting at first). So, instead I put on my big girl, veggie-loading pants and was determined to find a way to use them that didn’t feel I was force feeding myself. Maybe I would even find a way I kinda liked eggplant. A tall order and one that took some tries (luckily (?) the eggplant supply kept coming in the CSAs, so I had material to practice on). And eventually, this eggplant pasta bake happened….and um, it absolutely ticked the boxes of what I was looking for and I found myself …enjoying eggplant. So, while I still wouldn’t call eggplant my favorite vegetable, I will say, I have found ways to eat it when I find myself with one.
In the many times I made this, I found that how the eggplant is prepared makes the biggest difference. The large slices were a no-go for me texture-wise, so I dice it nice and small before roasting so it becomes tender and almost hides the pasta. If you’ve got someone at your table who’s a little skeptical of eggplant (past me included 🙋🏼♀️), that smaller texture makes a huge difference. The tomato sauce and melty cheese balance the earthy flavor of the eggplant beautifully and I added spinach to the mix because I am always looking to tuck in bonus veggies and it was easy. But it is also optional, so you can skip it if you prefer. So, while this roasted eggplant pasta is a big win in my eyes, one more tip if you or your family is extra iffy about this one. Peel the eggplant. You can see I clearly did not here, but that is because I have kinda grown to be okay with its texture and slightly bitter flavor (and because sometimes I’m just a bit lazy when it comes to dinner). But if this an eggplant warm up recipe….def peel it.
Okay. So there she is. As unexpected as it is, this is kind one of those truly delicious dinner recipes loaded with veggies that seems to be my superpower. It’s simple enough to make for a weeknight dinner, reheats really well for lunch the next day, and is easy to customize with extra vegetables or a protein if you’d like. If comfort-food-vibing vegetarian pasta dinners are your thing, my Creamy Broccoli Pasta is another you need to check out and absolutely put eyeballs on my Simple Pasta with Peas… its perfect for nights when dinner needs to come together with whatever happens to be in the pantry.
Let’s make dinner together. Just you and me…
Roasted Eggplant Pasta Bake with Spinach
Ingredients
- 1 pound eggplant, peeled if you like and then chopped.
- 2 tablespoons olive oil or avocado oil
- ½ medium yellow onion, diced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 pound dry pasta, use gluten-free if needed
- 24 ounces pasta sauce
- ½ cup mozzarella cheese, shredded, optional. Omit for dairy-free.
- 2 cups loosely packed baby spinach, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425℉.
- In a 9"x13" casserole pan, combine chopped eggplant, onions and garlic. Drizzle the oil over the top of the veggies and sprinkle with salt. Toss to coat.
- Place veggies in the preheated oven and roast for 30 minutes.
- While the veggies roast, cook pasta according to directions. Once done cooking, drain water and set pasta aside.
- When veggies are done roasting, add the cooked pasta, chopped spinach, and sauce to the casserole pan. Toss to coat and smooth out into an even layer. Sprinkle with cheese and put back into the oven for 5-10 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly.
- Enjoy warm. Allow leftovers to cool completely before storing in the fridge in an air-tight container for up to 4 days.
So glad you enjoyed it!
As always this came together so easily! I actually roasted the eggplant and made the pasta during weekly food prep, then just threw it all together and stuck in the oven for dinner one night. I added some mushrooms and spinach to make it go farther and I’m glad I did cause it’s been quickly eaten up!
This is really good. I had some eggplant was and looking for a way to use it and I came across this recipe. The only thing I did different was I had a little bit of zucchini when roasting the vegetables and some fresh basil before I put it in the oven the second time. My husband who claims to not like eggplant had two portions
I am so glad you enjoyed!
My family loved this!! One question, does this freeze well?
I’m so glad it was a hit, Denise! I don’t find pasta or eggplant to freeze super great. Edible, yes. But it’ll be a bit mushier onced thawed.
What size casserole dish? I grabbed a 9x 13 but I can’t imagine a whole pound of pasta is going to fit in with the eggplant.
Hi Heather! Thanks for pointing out that I didn’t have dimensions for the casserole dish in the recipe. Fixed! The dish I used for this recipe (and in the pictures) is indeed a 9×13. Everything fit beautifully, since the eggplant does cook down considerably.
I made this recipe using the kid-friendly vegetable tomato sauce in the notes. The only change I made was to use 6 oz. of pasta instead of 16. It was very good. I just have a couple suggestions. Since I made the sauce yesterday it was cool. I thought the cheese looked melted on top of the casserole and took it out of the oven at 6 1/2 minutes. It definitely needed 10 or more! (FYI) My carrots in the sauce were really sweet, which gave the casserole itself more of a sweet flavor. I will add more salt next time. I really like how pretty the casserole looks when it comes out of the oven. The colors are nice together. Even my husband commented on it
I’m glad you enjoyed it, Margaret! It is a really pretty casserole and love that you made my veggie pasta sauce to enjoy in this dish. Jarred sauces often have added sugar to help balance out the acidity of the the tomatoes, which I was trying to achieve with the natural sweetness of the carrots. Carrots can vary in sweetness (because Mother Nature likes to vary thing like that) and so totally adding some extra salt to balance that sweetness is a great idea, depending on the batch.
Another I will make this again recipe from Taesha! My eggplant wasn’t quite a pound, so I added some yellow bell pepper that was getting a little tired in the fridge. I also used little mozzarella balls mixed in and some grated parmesan on top. I definitely recommend warming for the full 15 minutes in the final step to make sure the sauce gets hot and not just warm. I have a slightly picky 23yo living at home and they didn’t pick up on it being eggplant. I know TNN isn’t about hiding vegetables, but I thought my kid might have a pile of eggplant left on their plate and nope!
Yay! I love that you were able to make this with what you had (and give the sad bell pepper a purpose!) AND it was a hit. And yep, not about hiding veggies, but I am ALL FOR finding ways to keeping iffy veggies friendly and approachable…and it sounds like this did that for your kid! Such a win, Shelly! Thanks for sharing!