I am pretty happy with the way my garden is doing this year. The credit is due to most oldest son who is a vegetarian and natural food fanatic. He really labored in the garden in the spring and we are now enjoy the fruit of his labor. I picked some beautiful bell peppers from the garden and two nice ichiban eggplants. I decided to make a ratatouille with these ingredients as the base.Ichiban eggplants are originally from Japan. They are great in a dish like this because the skin is thinner than regular eggplants and they are not as spongy, so they keep their shape in the vegetable stew. I used canned tomatoes because my tomatoes have not arrived in abundance yet. The sugar is to balance the acid of the tomatoes and to curb any bitterness there might be in the eggplant. If you prefer you can substitute a grated carrot. I served this dish as a side to grilled lamb chops.
Fresh From the Garden Ratatouille
2 T olive oil
2 ichiban eggplants or 1 regular eggplant
2 green peppers
1 medium onion
1 14 oz can of diced tomatoes or 6 peeled, seeded diced plum tomatoes
2-4 nice sprigs of fresh thyme
1 c. water
1 t. sugar
salt and pepper
Leave the skin on the eggplant. Cut the eggplant, green peppers and onion into a uniform dice about of about 1/2 inch. Put the olive oil and the onions into a cold pan. Turn heat onto medium, add a bit of salt and sweat the onions. When they are clear, add the rest of the vegetables, the water and thyme. Simmer over medium covered until vegetable are tender, about 45 minutes or so. Taste. Add sugar if necessary. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Enjoy!
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5 comments:
I think its a spam comment...
anyway, my son loves ratatouille though I don't cook it much because I cant afford to have too much time preparing and cooking lol. This is interesting with sugar on it.
Yea the spam thing is annoying. This recipe is so quick. I only do quick as I work 60 hours a week in my real job. As far as the sugar is concerned, I find eggplant can be bitter, so the sweetness counteracts that bitterness. You can use grated carrots if you don't want to use sugar.
Have Fun!
Bill
I hate spammers...to the point I like ..this is an excellent recipe and you think like me quick and easy recipes that are tasty and economic..well done and thx for sharing...saw you on foodbuzz..I have the same moto on my blog food
Another way to reduce the bitter taste of eggplant is to lay out your slices and salt them on both sides, and let it sit for 10 minutes before cooking. This will of course force you to change the amount of salt in the rest of the recipe, but if you are concerned about carbs, works as well as sugar.
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