Not Just a Man's World

Ratatouille is a tasty vegetable dish to have on the side of a winter joint of roast meat or with a piece of steak.  I’ve always loved ratatouille but due to Chris’s aversion to aubergine I’ve had to learn to leave aubergines out of the recipe.  Strangely I’ve found that I actually prefer it without the aubergine.

The key to getting the ratatouille to work is to cut the vegetables into large chunks rather than small pieces and to ensure that the mix doesn’t get too moist.  It’s therefore crucial to ensure that you drain the moisture out of the courgettes before you start – I tried to cut the preparation time down the other week by not draining it and ended up with a pot filled with squishy indistinguishable vegetable slop rather than firm lumps of each vegetable.

Ratatouille

Ingredients (serves 6):
3 large courgettes
2 large red onions, roughly chopped
2 bell peppers (yellow or green), roughly chopped
400g tin chopped tomatoes
4 large cloves of garlic, crushed
2 tbsp basil, roughly chopped

Directions:

1. Cut the courgettes in half down their length and then slice the halves into fat chunks (about half an inch wide).
2. Place the courgettes into a large colander over a bowl, mix well with salt, place a plate on top of the courgettes and weigh it down with something heavy (as someone with a free-weights gym in the garage, this wasn’t too hard for me).  Leave to stand for 30 mins to allow some of the water to be drawn out of the courgettes.
3. Heat some oil in a large pan with a lid (I use my large Le Creuset casserole dish that can be used on the stove top).  Gently fry the onions and garlic over a low heat for 10 minutes until the onion is soft and golden brown.
4. Dry the courgette slices with kitchen paper and add the courgette and peppers to the pan.  Turn the heat up slightly (to medium heat) and fry for a further couple of minutes, stirring frequently to ensure nothing burns.
5. Finally add the basil and tomatoes, stir into the vegetables, then cover the pan and simmer over a very low heat for 30 minutes.

The ratatouille in the picture above also has some mushrooms included, however this is always risky since they can easily add additional unwanted moisture to the mix.  To keep the consistency in this one I par-fried the mushrooms in a separate pan first but this does mean you loose some of the goodness from the mushrooms.

Related posts:

1. Paleo recipes: poor man’s ratatouille
2. Paleo recipes: chicken stir-fry
3. Paleo recipes: courgette and tomato au gratin
4. Paleo recipes: spicy beef bolognese