Ratatouille

OMG, a new post!
The horrid summer heat of Walnut Creek is receding, and a young girl's thoughts turn once more to ovens.

I looked in my fridge Thursday and realized that the only thing in there was all the ingredients for ratatouille.  Sio that had to happen!

There are a million ways to make this dish, but I primarily read Julia Child's recipe, the wikipedia article and a nice article in the Guardian.  (A shout out here to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, my 2yr home town paper).

Rifling through these I evaluated all steps for a) necessity and b) difficulty.  Here is what I did:

Step 1) make a piperade

• Saute one large onion (finely diced) and 2 bell peppers (finely diced) until soft
• Add minced garlic to taste, bay, thyme, and herbs de provence
• Add 2-3 small tomatoes (also finely chopped but neither peeled nor seeded) and simmer down till thick

Piperade

Grilled veggies are yumm

Step 2) grill veggies slices

• Slice up equal amounts of eggplant (1med-peeled)  zucchini (2 large) and tomatoes (3 med)
• Grill the zucchini and eggplant slices.  I did this on my cast iron griddle while simmering the piperade and it was very little effort for big payoff.

Step 3) bake it

• In a pot (I used the same cast iron one I had made the piperade in) layer piperade, zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, more piprerade.
•   I think I should actually have put the tomatoes between the eggplant and zucchini.
• Place in a 350F oven with a lid 3/4 on, and leave to bake down for 90min-2hrs/when your house starts smelling like deliciousness

I ate it with some Parmesan cheese over rice.  My only two criticisms:   Needs more eggplant!!!  Also, it seems a waste to cook heirloom tomatoes, given how delicious they are raw.  Especially in caprese.

Fun fact:  I found out while doing research that Thomas Keller was the consulting chef for the film Ratatouille.  I suspect this was just so Pixar guys could try and work expense meals at the French Laundry (The first place I will eat upon becoming filthy rich).

Heirloom tomatoes in all their glory

My camera is useless once the sun goes down.  I promise this looked more appealing than the amorphous yellow blob leftover when I remembered to take a pic at 10pm

Insalata Caprese

Unlike most posts here, which I write so that I can remember how to make food, this post in being written to share my favorite recipe.  I will never forget how to make it because a) it is dead simple and b) I make it 2-3x/month year round.

Insalata caprese is a 3 ingredient, uncooked, dish which means that it is ALL ABOUT ingredient quality.  Flavorless, unripe tomatoes will ruin it, and actual buffalo mozzarella takes it to the next level (for a while our local Costco sold giant tubs of authentic mozzarella buffala for $12.)

Ok, so you have assembled your perfect ingredients which are tomatoes, ovoline mozzarella, and basil leaves.  here is what you do with them:

• Slice the tomatoes thickly
• Put salt and pepper directly on the tomatoe (to taste)
• Slice the ovoline mozzarella more thinly, or in thick slices but cut in half, and place on top.  I usually do 1 ovoline per 2-3 tomatoes
• drizzle olive oil over this, or, if you have a Misto sprayer you can use that for an even coating
• top with a basil leaf

Look at that deliciousness!

Bruschetta

I made this as a quick lunch this weekend and wanted to note it down.  I am calling it bruschetta, but I think this may be a lie or an unforgivable abuse of grammar/the Italian language.  With the summer heat approaching I need a library of quick, cold, but satisfying meals.

Step One:  Toast 2 slices bread (optionally brush with olive oil first)
Step Two: make bruschetta by mixing these ingredients with salt and pepper to taste:

• Two tomatoes, chopped
• 1/4 cup sweet onion finely diced
• 1/4 cup fresh basil, cut as fine as you can

Step 3: Layer sliced ovaline mozzarella and generous portions of bruschetta on the toast.  The above amount does well for 2 people, with the toasts cut in half for 2 bruschetta each.