The grilled eggplant salad with sun-dried tomatoes and pine nuts is a simple and tasty recipe that lets you bring to the table a light and flavorful vegetarian and vegan dish. Grilled eggplants are delicious in their simplicity, but they are so versatile that you can make a thousand tasty recipes, like Oven-baked grilled eggplant rolls or Puff pastry with grilled eggplant, tomato and mozzarella, not to mention the Mediterranean-style eggplant rolls. Today, however, we’re here to turn our grilled eggplant slices into an original and tasty salad perfect for when eggplant recipes start to be in season. A fresh and hearty big salad to enjoy at lunch or dinner, ideal to take to the beach, the countryside or the office, and to prepare in advance, good on its own or as a side dish, excellent for those on a diet or who want to follow a vegetarian or vegan diet, or simply a healthy and balanced meal. Are you ready to discover with me how to make grilled eggplant salad? Let’s go to the kitchen, but first I remind you that if you want to stay updated on all my other recipes, you can follow my my Facebook page and my Instagram profile.

Do you like eggplants? Take a look:

Difficulty: Very easy
Cost: Very inexpensive
Rest time: 20 Minutes
Preparation time: 10 Minutes
Portions: 4
Cooking methods: Stovetop
Cuisine: Italian

Ingredients to make Grilled Eggplant Salad

1 eggplant (large)
2 oz sun-dried tomatoes in oil
to taste parsley
to taste extra virgin olive oil
to taste salt
to taste vinegar (if desired)
to taste pine nuts

Tools

Grill
Plate

Steps to make Grilled Eggplant Salad

For this recipe I grilled the eggplants on the stovetop and then reheated them in the microwave to make them softer, but this is not an essential step. If you don’t have a microwave and still want very soft eggplants, you can grill them in the oven, following the method I use in this recipe: Quick savory pastry with puff pastry and eggplant.

Wash the eggplants and peel them. Slice them about 3/8 inch thick (≈1 cm) and meanwhile preheat a cast-iron skillet. Cook the slices on both sides, lightly salting them; as you go, collect them on a flat plate, add a drizzle of oil and keep them warm by stacking them on top of each other and covering them with another plate.
Once all the slices are grilled, to make them softer use a trick that is not indispensable but very helpful: put the eggplants in the microwave for about 5 minutes and after that time let them rest for another 5 minutes. The eggplants will finish the cooking already started in the pan and will become soft rather than dry.
Allow the eggplant slices to cool completely and season with chopped parsley, coarsely chopped sun-dried tomatoes, one garlic clove halved (which you can easily remove), and toasted pine nuts.
The salad is ready; you can enjoy it cold, at room temperature, or after a few hours of resting.