the veggies

The veggies always look so good when I first start cooking with them, before I cut them up. The only problem with this recipe, from the Julia Child Mastering the Art of French Cooking, is that she doens’t always say how much in cups the veggies are, or how many veggies should be used. I suppose it is easier to just say how many pounds, but I don’t have scale, so that doesn’t help me.

cooking the veggies

Like the Indian version, things get cooked seperatly before they are mixed together.

I have skilled tomatoes before, but this recipe called for seeing and juicing them as well. You send up with pulp, which I did. The goal appeared to be as to get as much juice out of the tomato as possible. Not only before it went into the mix, but after it was in the mix. The recipe kept calling for all the juice to be absorbed.

The Indian version was very soupy, while this one seemed drier.

the finished product

Also,unless I missed something, there were no spices added other than salt and pepper.

Perhaps, if I had tried this one first, I would have found the Indian version odd, now I find this one odd.

All the veggies cut up

I don’t always manage to cook all the veggies I get in my basket from my CSA before the next week comes about. This week, I was bound and determined to do so. I looked at what I had, and found a recipe that would work, and spend the day, every time I went into the kitchen, gathering up the supplies, so they would all be there, and ready when it was time to cook.

The recipe, Indian Ratatouille, is from the Moosewood Restaurant New Classics. I was surprised, and delighted that not only did I have all the veggies, but I had almost all the spices. Now, granted, I didn’t have as much of all the ingredients as were called for, but I felt it was close enough.

Here is what was called for:

• 2 cups diced onions
• 2 tablespoons veggie oil
• 2 large garlic cloves (I usually use much more than that)
• 1 fresh chile (I used dried chile)
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger root (I used dried)
• 1 tspn ground cumin
• 1 tspn ground coriander
• 1/2 tspn turmeric
• 1/2 tspn ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tspn ground cardamon
• 1 tspn salt
• pinch of saffron (which I didn’t have at all)
• 1 cup of orange juice ( I used water)
• 5 cups cubed eggplant (I had about 2 cups worth)
• 4 cups cubed zucchini, squash, or pattypan (this I had, all of them)
• 1 1/2 cups bell peppers (I had about a cup)
• 3 cups fresh tomatoes
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil

cooking the veggies

As it is with onions, you cook those first, and then add the garlic, chile giner and spices. The eggplant and juice were added last, and then the squash bell peppers, tomatoes and basil.

It was amazing. I served it on rice, I had made earlier. I knew I had to make it again. Not sure how it will turn out with the orange juice, as this was great.  I’m sure the saffron will ad something to it.

And eating it all

This dish has lasted me for a few days now, and it great reheated.

So, now I got curious. What would the more traditional ratatouille taste like. I decided to make the Julia Child version next.

Making the Tahini

We received eggplant in our basket this week, only one, but a trip to the farmer’s market fixed that, and we were able to make baba ganoush. I was all excited, as I had never made it before, and the first thing I noticed, once I got home, was that I had to make tahini.

I had tried making tahini before, but decided to try again. Found that it went a little better this time, because I wasn’t expecting a smooth sort of mix. In fact, the recipe I used said that it would turn out coarse, and not to worry about it. So I didn’t. I took 2 cups of white seasame seeds, and toasted them, then put them in the food processor with oil.

Roasted eggplant

The next step was to roast the eggplants.  The recipe I used called to prick each eggplant and char the outsides before baking them in the oven. Even though the recipe said to roast for 30 minutes, in ended up taking over an hour. Once the eggplants were coolish, I peeled and scooped the insides out.

Then I put them in the food processor with the lemon juice (3 tablespoons), 3 garlic cloves, 1/8 teaspoon chile powder and some parsley which I remembered to add at the last moment.

Finsihed Baba

Once it was done, I put it in a container and put it in the fridge to cool. Cartoonist tasted it, dipping first nan, then a carrot and decided that it was a good recipe we should make again.