A ratatouille is a beautiful summer excuse to transform humble ingredients like onions, garlic and herbs in to a glorious and delicious dish. This recipe is very healthy but packed with big flavors. I use zucchini and yellow squash in this version but you could add eggplant, peppers and thin slices of potatoes for a more powerful version.
I quickly chop all the tomatoes, shallot, carrot and garlic with a food processor and then I pour all the chopped vegetables in a baking dish with my herbs and good olive oil. I layer the zucchini by making mini-stacks of about 20 slices in sequence, and then I arrang a few stacks at a time into the prepared baking dish in a concentric spiral from the outer edge to the inside, fanning them out.
I made the ratatouille with my kids for dinner. I sliced the zucchini, they stacked the slices for me in neat piles. We talked about summer plans and they filled me in on the latest stories. We played a game of badmington on the lawn and while I miserably lost every set, I won precious time with them, away from twitter and the unwatchable news #RESIST
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- 3 medium ripe plum tomatoes
- 1 medium shallot, peeled and chopped
- 1 small peeled and roughly chopped carrot
- 1 small peeled garlic clove
- 4 tablespoons virgin olive oil
- 4 tablespoons 3 tsp fresh thyme, basil, parsley finely chopped
- 3 medium zucchini
- 3 medium yellow squash
- fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
- Preheat oven to 400°F.
- In a food processor add the chopped tomatoes, shallot, carrot and the garlic. Chop all the vegetable but stop before they become a puree', leaving a rough texture.
- Pour the chopped vegetables, 1 Tablespoon of olive oil and half of the chopped fresh herbs into a medium baking dish. Season with salt and pepper.
- Using a mandolin, or a really sharp knife, thinly and evenly, slice the vegetables. Make the slices thin, about 1/8’ (3mm) thick.
- Make mini-stacks of about 20 slices in sequence. Arrange a few stacks at a time into the prepared baking dish in a concentric spiral from the outer edge to the inside, fanning them out a bit so that you can see the top 1/8” of all the slices. “Stand” them up a little, so you can it as many vegetable slices in as possible, but you may still have some leftover veggies. Save the smaller rounds for the center of the dish.
- Drizzle with the remaining tablespoon of olive oil and season with more salt and pepper. Sprinkle the remaining chopped herbs. Cover the dish with a piece of parchment paper cut to it just inside the dish rim, directly on top of the vegetable arrangement.
- Bake for 40 minutes -1 hour
