Recipe: Lidia Bastianich’s Meatballs with Eggplant (Polpette con Melanzane)

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Lidia Bastianich Meat Balls by Diana DeLucia
Lidia Bastianich’s Meatballs with Eggplant (Photo by Diana DeLucia) (The original image is no longer available, please contact KCRW if you need access to the original image.)

Famed celebrity chef, restauranteur, food entrepreneur Lidia Bastianich has released a new book co-authored with her daughter, Tania Bastianich Manuali. Mastering the Art of Italian Cuisine is a tome, a reference work, a new bible filled with traditional classics.

I asked her to tell me about her recipe for Meatballs with Eggplant. Here is an edited version of our conversation:

It’s interesting now to watch this new sort of new restaurant world unfold with these amazing young chefs who are bringing their own stories and combining local ingredients, and yet still you see meatballs on the plate.

Well, you know, meatballs are comfort food. In Abruzzi they make smaller meatballs, and they put them in the lasagnas, in the sauce. We up north have the polpette—they were smaller, and they were kind of flat and pan-fried and not necessarily in the sauce.

I understand that you combine your meatballs with eggplant. Why?

Yes, I love working with vegetables, and I think part of the greatness, shall I say, of Italian cuisine is this intense use of vegetables, whether you’re making the sauce or making the meat. Legumes and vegetables were always used, and used in abundance.

Once the immigrants came to America, one of the things they did find was the abundance of meat, hence the bigger meatball and so on. But I do include vegetables wherever I can. So I put eggplant in the meatballs themselves, and it makes a delicious meatball and sauce.

Meatballs with Eggplant (Polpette con Melanzane)

Yield: Serves 10 or more

Sauce Ingredients
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 medium onions, chopped
4 28 oz cans Italian plum tomatoes (preferably San Marzano, passed through a food mill)
2 tsp kosher salt
3 fresh bay leaves
½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

Meatball Ingredients
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 medium eggplants (about 1¼ lbs), peeled and cut into ½-inch cubes
2 tsp kosher salt
2½ lbs ground beef
1 lbs sweet Italian sausage, removed from casings
2 cups fine dried bread crumbs
½ cup chopped fresh Italian parsley
½ cup freshly grated Grana Padano
2 large eggs

For the sauce: In a large Dutch oven, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the chopped onion and cook until it is slightly softened, about 4 minutes. Add the tomatoes, rinse out the tomato cans with 4 cups water, and add that as well. Add the salt, bay leaves and red pepper flakes. Bring to a simmer and cook, uncovered, until slightly thickened, about 20 minutes.

For the meatballs: Meanwhile, in a large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, add the onion. Cook until it almost softened, about 6 minutes, then add the eggplants and season with salt. Cover and cook until the eggplant and onion are tender, about 10 minutes. Scrape everything onto a sheet pan to cool.

In a large bowl, mix the cooled eggplant with the beef, sausage, bread crumbs, parsley, grated cheese and eggs until the mixture just holds together. Form into about forty 2” meatballs on parchment-lined sheet pans.

Add the meatballs to the sauce and simmer until the meatballs are cooked through and the sauce is flavorful, about 35 to 40 min­utes, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, to make sure that the meatballs on the bottom don’t stick.

Lidia’s note: This makes a big batch and can be kept in the refrigerator or freezer to be used for future meals. If you don’t want to make such a big batch, you can easily halve everything.