Orecchiette pasta with aubergine sauce

This recipe is, if you will, 'pasta alla norma' - a classic Sicilian pasta dish with aubergine sauce - revisited. It is made from orecchiette pasta mixed with fresh tomato sauce and fried aubergine, but to which we have added some lightly cooked cherry tomatoes and a lovely buffalo mozzarella cut into cubes. In short, a very special dish, just right perhaps for a low-key Sunday lunch, but decidedly Mediterranean and quite irresistible!

Heat the garlic in a pan with some olive oil; add the tomato sauce and the washed and halved cherry tomatoes. Simmer over a low heat. Meanwhile, cut out the aubergine's core and then slice into strips. Fry the aubergine in hot oil, add salt and then set aside on kitchen paper. Cut the mozzarella into small cubes, and set these aside too. Cook the pasta in salted, boiling water. Once cooked, drain the orecchiette and toss in the prepared sauce, adding the mozzarella cubes, the fried aubergine and a few leaves of chopped basil.