Ingredients
- 1 kg aubergines
- 160 g stale whole loaf
- 80 g Parmigiano Reggiano Dop
- 1 egg
- 1 spring onion
- 1 garlic
- bread crumbs
- parsley
- extra virgin olive oil
- peanut oil
- basil
- salt
- pepper
Duration: 1 h 30 min
Level: Easy
Dose: 25 pieces
To prepare the aubergine balls, wash the aubergines and peel them in alternating strips. Cut them into cubes and cook them in a pan with 3-4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and a piece of garlic: roast them for 10 minutes, with a pinch of salt, then cover with a lid and cook for another 5 minutes. Cook them in two stages, according to the size of the pan, renewing oil and garlic.
Gather the aubergines cooked in a bowl and let them cool.
Cut meanwhile, the diced bread and soften it in the water: it must be well soaked, but not enough to flake.
Leave soak for about 15 minutes, then squeeze it very well and crumble it with your hands in a large bowl, obtaining a kind of couscous.
Chop a sprig of basil and a parsley and mix 2 tablespoons with the crumbled bread.
shredded eggplants with a knife in a not too fine beat; add them to the bread together with the green of a finely chopped spring onion, the egg, the grated Parmesan, salt and pepper. Mix everything with your hands, working the dough until it is homogeneous. Finally, mix it with 50 g of breadcrumbs and let it rest for about ten minutes
Prepare a tray with a generous layer of breadcrumbs.
formed meatballs with the dough: you will get about 25, the size of apricots, about 4-5 cm in diameter.
Place them on the tray and roll them in the breadcrumbs.
Fry the meatballs by immersing them in plenty of hot peanut oil, for about 3-4 minutes. Fry a few at a time, so as not to lower the oil temperature too much and to avoid breaking the meatballs. Drain them on kitchen paper.
Also in the oven: frying in this case is the most suitable cooking because the meatballs, cooking quickly immersed in oil, retain their shape and the flavor is enhanced by the crust. But you can also cook them in the oven: they will be less crunchy but equally tasty. Place them in a pan, grease them with a drizzle of oil and bake them at 200 ° C for 15-20 minutes, turning them occasionally. A second alternative is to brown them in a pan with a little extra virgin olive oil, a few at a time, moving them continuously with great delicacy so as not to break them; they will be ready in 10 minutes.