Enjoy my Sicilian Style Seafood on your table tonight!
One of the great joys of life for me is cooking. I love to mix up flavors, textures and add the unexpected to dishes whenever I can. That doesn’t I still don’t enjoy the classics, but every now and then I like to change it up a bit.
The one thing I miss about my restaurant days is having all of those ingredients at my fingertips. All prepped, cut, and ready to go…… My sauces sitting on the back of the range and those special ingredients that I had for the night.
One of the greatest lessons Mama Jeanette taught me was to listen to the food. She would tell me “sonny boy, the food will tell you what it wants if you just listen”, and she was right. In my restaurant days, mixing ingredients had been my gift I, simply knowing without knowing what to add to make each creation a memorable experience. And when I had so many things to choose from sometimes those meals dishes became events.
Being at the shore everyone loved seafood, and broiled combos, lobsters and shrimp were always big sellers. What I tried to do was change the way my customers thought of seafood, and began serving it with different combinations of flavors and ingredients.
One of my favorite ingredients to use as a base is quick-fried eggplant. Tender and oh so flavorful, eggplant found itself under a number of different sauces and a variety of seafood.
What do I need to make Sicilian Style Seafood?
Let’s start by gathering the ingredients we need to make Sicilian Style Seafood. In Chef Speak this is called the Mise en Place which translates into Everything in its Place.
Not only does setting your ingredients up ahead of time speed the cooking process, but it also helps ensure you have everything you need to make the dish.
How do I make Sicilian Style Seafood?
Let’s start by prepping the eggplant.
- Coat eggplant in flour seasoned with sea salt and black pepper
- Dip the floured eggplant into an egg wash
- Coat the egg-washed eggplant cutlet into the seasoned breadcrumbs, completely coating the eggplant
- Repeat the process until the eggplant is breaded
Saute the breaded eggplant cutlets until golden brown.
With the eggplant prepped we can now get started on the sauce and seafood. Start by sauteing the peppers, onions and mushrooms in a little olive oil. Then adding in the shrimp and scallops to the pan. Cook the seafood till almost done and remove the shrimp and scallops from the pan.
After removing the shrimp and scallops from the saute pan, add the garlic, olives, basil, and seasoning. Add additional olive oil if needed.
Add the tomato sauce and grated Romano cheese to the pan and let the sauce simmer for 5 minutes. When the sauce is ready add the shrimp and scallops to the pan and continue simmering for another 3-4 minutes.
Serve the Sicilian Style Seafood over a quick-fried eggplant plank and linguine.
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Sicilian Style Seafood
Ingredients
Eggplant Planks
- 2 slices eggplant cut the long way
- ½ cup flour seasoned with sea salt and black pepper
- 1 large egg whipped with a little added water
- ½ cup bread crumbs seasoned or plain
Sicilian Style Seafood
- olive oil as needed
- 6 large shrimp cleaned peeled and deveined
- 8 large scallops
- ½ cup diced onion diced
- ½ cup red pepper diced
- 1 cup mushrooms sliced
- 1 clove garlic chopped
- ⅓ cup green and black olives sliced
- 2 cups tomato sauce or crushed tomatoes
- ½ cup grated Romano cheese
- 1 tbsp fresh basil chopped
- ⅙ tsp crushed red pepper flakes
- sea salt and black pepper to taste
Assembly
- ½ lb linguine
- 1 tsp parsley finely chopped
- 2 eggplant planks quick-fried
Instructions
Quick Fried Eggplant Planks
- Peel and slice eggplant into long planks
- flour eggplant planks, dip in egg wash, then into seasoned bread crumbs. continue until all the eggplant planks have been breaded.
- Heat pan and add olive oil and quick fry breaded eggplant planks on both sides until golden brown. Keep warm in 250 degree oven until ready to serve.
- {Start water for pasta. Begin cooking pasta when the sauce is simmering }
Sicilian Style Seafood
- In a large skillet hot and add a little olive oil, mushrooms, peppers, and onions. Saute until mushrooms and peppers have softened.
- Add the shrimp and scallops to the pan and sear them on both sides. Cook until almost done, then remove the seafood from the pan and hold until needed.Do not cook the seafood completely, it will be finished later in the sauce.
- Add olives, garlic, basil, and seasonings to the pan and continue to saute for 2-3 minutes.
- Add the tomato sauce and grated Romano cheese to the pan and let the sauce simmer for 5 minutes. If the mixture gets too thick add in a little water.
- When the sauce is ready to serve add the shrimp and scallops to the pan and continue simmering for another 4-6 minutes.
Assembly
- Place fried eggplant plank on plate and a mound of past next to it. Place shrimp and scallops on eggplant, spoon sauce over both and enjoy!
Lori | The Kitchen Whisperer
Oh my does this sound and look amazing!!! My Italian inlaws will go NUTS over this! Thank so so much for sharing this! I’m all the ingredients to my shopping list!
Marta
It’s so funny that you mentioned how she told you the food will speak to you if you listen. I always tell people who are learning to cook that you can actually feel what food wants you to do. Great advice and a great-looking recipe!
Marina
Love this linguini pasta dish with sea food, truly delicious seaside recipe. Makes me remember sitting on the seafront and enjoying the pasta with sea food on the hot summer day
Amy
This was so good! Easy to make and also we are such seafood lovers. thanks!
Estelle Forrest
An absolutley gorgeous dish made from a sea bounty!
Andréa Janssen
This is a recipe with such a lot of flavor. Really delicious!
Emily Flint
Everyone loved this seafood pasta! I will definitely be making this again in the future.
Gloria
I am a pasta lover. Shimp and pasta are a delicious combination. Love the addition of eggplant in this weeknight winner dinner.
Sue
The sauce for this Sicilian seafood is wonderful. And I love the use of eggplant – so unexpected!
Alexandra
We are huge eggplant fans, and this pasta is our new favourite! So delicious!
Diane Buerkle
Chef Dennis – we made this wonderful recipe last night – it was fantastic!! Restaurant worthy for sure! We followed the recipe very closely only making small changes to accommodate our personal tastes and slicing the eggplant in round slices so we could leave the skin on for cooking. Also, salted the slices both sides and placed on paper towels for 45 minutes to draw out the moisture prior to cooking.
This recipe is definitely a keeper! Thanks so much for sharing!
Chef Dennis Littley
Thanks for letting me know you enjoyed my recipe Diane! And I always say recipes are simply guidelines, I’m glad you adapted it to make it your own
Kimby
I’m so glad Mama Jeanette encouraged your knack for finding flavor combinations by listening to the food! Terrific advice!
Minnie@thelady8home
This looks so delicious!! Bookmarking it!!
Candace
This looks delicious! I love, love, love eggplant AND seafood.
Laura (Tutti Dolci)
This looks so good, Chef! Love the eggplant and seafood pairing!
Betty Ann @Mango_Queen
This recipe is divine. I’m reading this post at lunch time and I’m drooling. Must bookmark this to try soon. I love eggplant so much and this is right up my alley. Thanks for sharing, Chef Dennis!
Larry
Looks amazing Dennis as your dishes always do. If I were wealthy, I’d try to hire you away from your school but since I’m not, I’ll just try to replicate some of your food.
Happy Ramblings
What an interesting mix of flavours and so quick and easy to make! Aubergines are in season here at the moment so I have added this to my list of recipes to try.
RavieNomNoms
Oh that looks just simply perfect!! YUM!
anna
i love your seafood! this looks delish! can’t wait to try those eggplant planks…