Meatless Monday - Ratatouille

I've made this before but my recent harvests rather demand it. One keen eyed observer even predicted it! But with tomatoes, peppers, onions, eggplant, crooked neck squash, basil and parsley all from the garden it would be harder to justify not making it rather than repeating from a year ago.

I follow the suggestion from the  Gourmet cookbook and cook the components separately before combining them for a final simmer. The results are worth it!

Ratatouille
Ingredients:
2-3 pounds of tomatoes roughly chopped - If you want you can peel them first, but I don't bother
2 big onions sliced thinly
2 lbs each of zucchini and eggplant cut into bite size chunks - I used crooked neck squash instead of zucchini
3 bell peppers, seeded and cut into 1" chunks
1 cup chopped flat leaf parsley
1 handful of basil leaves torn in half - about 20
6-10 cloves garlic thinly sliced
1+ cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon  fresh ground pepper
salt

Directions:
In a large pot over medium heat, add the chopped tomatoes, garlic, parsley and basil and 1/3 cup of olive oil. Bring to a simmer and cover. Simmer about 30 minutes until the tomatoes break down.

Meanwhile.... put the eggplant in a colander and sprinkle with salt. Place over a pan or in the sink while it drains.

In a big saute pan heat 3 tbs olive oil. Add the onions and a pinch of salt, cook until soft - about 10 minutes  - remove to a bowl with a slotted spoon.

Repeat procedure with peppers, crooked neck squash (or zucchini) adding olive oil and salt each time.

Finally, blot dry the eggplant, add another 3 tbs of olive oil (no salt) and the eggplant - cook until soft about 10-12 minutes.

Add all the cooked vegetables and black pepper to the simmering tomatoes. Simmer for another hour or so until the vegetables are very tender.

Taste and adjust the salt and pepper as needed.

Serve hot, warm or room temperature with some crusty bread. It's like summer in a bowl!

Until next time, Eat Well & Keep Digging! 

The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
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Meatless Monday - "Ratatouille" Panini

This time of year is great with all the produce in the garden or farmers market. One of my favorite things to make is ratatouille, that delicious vegetable stew featuring eggplant, zucchini, and tomatoes.

I had picked up some nice bread at the market, and thought, why not use those same flavors and make a sandwich, a toasted sandwich. A Ratatouille Panini!

Here in the States panini is used to denote a grilled sandwich, but the word comes from the Italian panino, meaning little roll. Panini is the plural form. So while the word is bastardized here in North America, it conjures an image of toasty crusty crunchy deliciousness. And when the stars of the sandwich come from your own garden? Well, it is only so much the better! I won't give exact measurements since I don't know how big you want your sandwich, and, being a sandwich it is a highly flexible "recipe." See what's fresh and take it from there!

Here's what I did.


Ingredients:
Good bread
2-3 Tomatoes sliced 1/3" thick
Eggplant sliced into rounds
Zucchini sliced into rounds
Bell pepper, preferably red or yellow sliced into sections
2 Garlic bulbs, separated into cloves and peeled
olive oil
Herbs de Provence
salt
softened goat cheese (optional)
Rosemary sprigs (optional)

Directions:
In a small sauce pan add garlic cloves and rosemary. Add enough olive oil to cover. Cook over very low heat, don't boil. Simmer for about an hour. When the garlic cloves are very tender, remove from heat and let cool.

While garlic poaches, prepare the vegetables.

Preheat oven to 225-250F.

Put cut vegetables on cooling rack over a cookie sheet, sprinkle eggplant and zucchini with salt to draw out moisture. Allow to sit for 30 minutes, blot moisture with paper towel. Turn the vegetables over and repeat the process.

Sprinkle the vegetables with the Herbs de Provence.

Put vegetables in slow oven until tender and slightly dry. Check at 1 hour, then every 30 minutes after that.

Here's what I had after the slow roasting.

I have and used a panini press but you could use a ribbed skillet or even a grill outdoors. Work with what you have.

Remove the garlic cloves from the oil.

Grill the vegetables (except the tomatoes, they will bee too delicate) brushing with the garlic infused oil.

Assemble the sandwich.  Smear the tender garlic onto one side of one of the pieces of bread.  Smear the other piece with the goat cheese. These are the inside part of the sandwich.

Layer the vegetables onto one of the pieces of bread.

Put the other piece of bread on top. Brush the top with a generous amount of the garlic infused oil. Put the  sandwich oiled side down on the panini press or skillet or whatever you are using. Oil the other side.

Grill until toasty and starting to char in spots.  Remove from press and allow to cool slightly before cutting in two. This  served two.

It was absolutely delicous, crunchy bread, tender vegetables, the garlic mellowed by poaching. A perfect summer dinner.

What vegetables do you have on hand?

Until next time, Eat Well & Keep Digging!


The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - @gastrogardener
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener
email: thegastronomicgardener at gmail dot com

Eggplant stuffed tomatoes

A reader send me a recipe for zucchini  stuffed tomatoes. Well, with today's harvest, I decided to take that recipe and give it a twist to make use of what I had on hand.

Ingredients:
2 Japanese eggplants medium dice
1 small onion diced
1/2 cup diced mushrooms
7 tomatoes,

4 cloves garlic finely diced

1 tsp Herbs De Provence

2 tsp olive oil + more for drizzling

1/2 cup bread crumbs

1/2 cup grated Parmesan (I know the picture shows mozzarella, but I changed my mind at the last minute.

salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F
Heat olive oil over medium heat. Add garlic and onions.

Cook until onions are soft, stirring often.

Add eggplant and mushrooms and a pinch of salt and grind of pepper.

Cook over medium heat until eggplant browns stirring often. Add herbs.

While eggplant cooks, cut top third of tomatoes off and remove veins, seeds and pulp. Repeat with the rest of the tomatoes.

Add half the Parmesan and bread crumbs to the eggplant mixture, stir to mix.

Stuff the tomato shells with the eggplant mixture.

Mix the remaining bread crumbs and cheese. Sprinkle over the top of each stuffed tomato. Drizzle each with a little olive oil.

Put in preheated oven for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, change oven to broil, and broil for 3-5 minutes until tops are browned.

Enjoy!


The Gastronomic Gardener
Garden blog http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
Cooking blog http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/
Twitter - www.twitter.com/DavidPOffutt
http://www.facebook.com/TheGastronomicGardener

Ratatouille

We've been eating a lot of meat lately, and now the vegetables are starting to come in. Yesterday in the garden saw a nice harvest of bush beans. I love a good vegetable stew so let’s dig in the fridge and see what we can do.


Looks like I have enough to make some ratatouille based on Molly Katzen's Recipe from the Moosewood cookbook. Along the way I used the green beans from the garden and decided to skip a can of tomatoes that was slightly bowed on the ends. Better safe than sorry.

Nice ingredients: Salt, pepper, olive oil, tomatoes, green bean from the garden, sweet peppers, mushrooms, summer squash and zuchinni, onion, garlic, herbs from the garden, eggplant.

Twenty minutes later, it's all broken down and ready to go.

Look closely, the original one - on the right, appears slightly bowed compared to the one on the left. I discarded the one on the right.

Olive oil, add the onion and garlic and cook for about 5 minutes over medium heat.

Next add the eggplant, mushrooms, herbs, and salt. Cover and cook, stirring every 5 minutes for about 20 minutes.

Add the rest of the ingredients, cover, and cook for about 30 minutes or until vegetables are tender.

Plate and enjoy!

My garden blog  http://amidwestgarden.blogspot.com/
My cooking blog  http://ihopeyouarehungry.blogspot.com/