Our Classic Eggplant Parmesan Recipe Is A (Worthwhile!) Labor Of love (2024)

FAQs

Does eggplant parmesan really induce labor? ›

There is even a wall in the restaurant with photos of “Eggplant Babies” and testimonials on their website! While the urban legend states this recipe will induce labor and there is no real scientific proof, the idea can be a fun thing to talk about and defiantly something to enjoy.

To get the best results, you'll want to fire up the oven, grill, or stovetop before freezing eggplant. Because of its high water content, eggplant doesn't freeze well raw. It benefits from being cooked (even just partially) first.

In the 15^th and 16^th centuries, cooking “Parmigiana style” simply referred to the practice of layering vegetables in casseroles. Some authorities insist that the name of the dish comes from the Sicilian word palmigiana, or shutters—a reference to the palm-thatched roofs that the eggplant slices resemble.

I scoured the internet for ways to trigger labour. And that's when I found it: the famous labour-inducing eggplant parmesan. I got the recipe online from Scalini's, an Italian restaurant in Cobb County, Georgia, whose eggplant parmesan is famous for sending hundreds of women into labour within 48 hours of eating it.

Older recipes call for salting eggplant to draw out the bitter juices, but today's eggplants are less bitter (unless very large), so salting is largely unnecessary. It will, however, help the spongy flesh absorb less oil and crisp up like a dream.

While most eggplants these days are bred to be less bitter, every once in a while you may still get one that is. The reason for this is likely because it's old. Young, fresh eggplants that you purchase at the farmers market are rarely bitter because they're newly picked.

Eggplants are known to absorb a lot of fat while cooking. A useful tip to prevent sogginess and greasiness is to salt sliced or diced eggplant and let it sit for an hour. This helps to draw out moisture. Next, rinse and drain any liquid from the sliced eggplant, then pat dry before cooking.

The peel of an eggplant is completely edible. However, as the eggplant grows bigger and matures, the peel may become tough and bitter. People often prefer to peel larger eggplants because of this, but smaller eggplants do just fine unpeeled. It ends up being a matter of personal preference.

The USDA says food that has been left out of the fridge for more than two hours should be thrown away. At room temperature, bacteria grows incredibly fast and can make you sick. Reheating something that has been sitting at room temperature for longer than two hours won't be safe from bacteria.

Modern eggplant has had bitterness nearly bred out of it, so many cooks have given up the practice. Salting the slices for eggplant Parmesan is not to prevent bitter flavors, but to season the eggplant itself and, at least in my experience, keep the eggplant from sucking up too much of the olive oil from frying.

Does Olive Garden have eggplant parmesan? ›

Hand-breaded eggplant, lightly fried and topped with marinara and melted mozzarella. Served with a side of spaghetti. Available weekdays, 11am-3pm.

Two Southern Italian regions, Puglia (the heel of the boot) and Campania (home of Naples), have their own versions of Eggplant Parmigiana, as recorded in La Cucina: The Regional Cooking of Italy. For the recipe from Puglia, the eggplant is dipped in egg, dredged in flour and fried.

Eggplant's reputation as a possible labor kick-starter is most likely due to a famous eggplant parmesan dish at a restaurant near Atlanta, Georgia, called Scalini's, known for its "eggplant babies." According to lore, when pregnant women eat the dish, they go into labor within two days.

Therefore, if pregnant women eat eggplant in a moderate amount, it is considered a very safe food to supplement nutrients during pregnancy.

The lore surrounding Scalini's eggplant parmesan eventually led the restaurant to compile a wall of photographs — affectionally known as the “Baby Eggplant Club” — filled with hundreds of pictures of infants supposedly born because their mothers had eaten the eggplant parmesan within hours or days of giving birth.