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26 July 2011

Oven Ratatouille

Not exacly quick, this may take 30 minutes in the oven, depending on how soft or how crunchy you want the veggies, it is nevertheless a quick and easy recipe that can be prepared in advance and briefly warmed up before serving.
What you need:

  • 500g of tomates or cherry tomatoes, the riper the better
  • 1 or 2 medium-sized courgettes/zucchini
  • 1 small aubergine (if you don't like them you can leave them out)
  • 1 yellow pepper (sweet)
  • 1 green pepper (sweet) to add colour
  • 1 chili pepper (more if you like it spicy, minus the seeds if you don't)
  • finely chopped herbs (my choice would be rosemary, flatleaved parsley, lovage in moderate doses, oregano and thyme) to taste.
  • 2 medium sizes spring onions (with green) 
  • 4 or more cloves of garlic
  • olive oil to grease an ovenproof dish generously and to sauté the onions and garlic
  • a dash of Marsala or sherry
  • salt and pepper

What you do:

  1. Pour some olive oil into an ovenproof dish and make sure it is coated all round.
  2. Cut the vegetables into pieces, tomatoes into cubes, aubergines and courgettes into slices and quarters, peppers into 1 cubes.
  3. Salt and pepper to taste
  4. Chop the spring onions with as much green as is usable and the garlic and fry in olive oil without letting it colour.
  5. Add a good slug of Marsala or sherry (ca. 50 ml) and reduce the liquid briefly. 
  6. Pour the onions and the juices over the the vegetables and put in the oven preheated to about 175°. 
  7. Add the herbs (or leave this till about ten minutes before you take  the ratatouille out of the oven.
  8. Roast the vegetables to a softness you like, anything between 20 and 40 minutes.
  9. If the mixture looks dry, add a bit more Marsala
  10. For a crisp top put under the grill for a couple of minutes.
Serve this either piping hot with fresh bread or as a vegetable sidedish with a meat (I don't really ever do this but am told it works well) or as tepid sort of salady dish on a hot summer evening.


This shows "one I prepared earlier"; it's not that dishes go from square to round in our oven...

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