Ratatouille

My Mother and I took the kids to see Ratatouille last weekend and it did get me wanted to make the dish just as it made every other food lover and blogger out there want to. I have made the traditional Ratatouille before and I did like it.


My Daughter (31/2), as always, helped me make this Ratatouille. first we did my dish and she handed me each item as needed; however, when we were done there was a lot left over so I let her make her own. She layered the zucchini, yellow zucchini, eggplant, mushrooms and peppers and when she done layering I let her chose what herbs to put on it she chose the thyme and lavender that I used and then she went through my array of dried herbs and pulled out tarragon, it was not bad in the end. To tell the truth both were wonderful, better then the last time I made it.


1 small white onion finely diced
2 T olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 large clove garlic, sliced very thin
3 T. tomato paste
1 cup canned while tomatoes, pured into a sauce
1 t fresh thyme
1 t fresh lavender
1/2 t dried rosemary
1 t Serbian Soup seasoning
pepper
1 medium Zucchini, sliced very thin
1 medium yellow zucchini, sliced very thin (I would have used summer squash but they were very small so I got the yellow zucchini to try to be consistent with size)
1 Asian eggplant, sliced very thin (again to be size consistent I got the Asian)
3 large white mushrooms (I love mushrooms and add them were I can)
1 red pepper, sliced very thin (I got one that was long and narrow)
olive oil

saute the onions in 2 T olive oil until translucent and add minced garlic and cook for a minute. add in paste and cook until it fragrant and then pour in tomato sauce and bring to boil. add in, the soup seasoning half of the thyme, half of the lavender and the rosemary. Remove from heat.

Preheat oven to 400F

place a layer of sauce on the bottom of a oven proof dish. spread the thin slices of garlic on the sauce, then arrange slices of prepared vegetables concentrically from the outer edge to the inside of the baking dish, overlapping so just a smidgen of each flat surface is visible, alternating vegetables

pour a drizzle of olive oil over the layers of vegetables and sprinkle with remaining thyme and lavender and season with salt and pepper. cover with parchment cut to size and bake for about 50 minutes.
I served the Ratatouille with french baguette and some plain low-fat yogurt for a light and refreshing dinner.


I did not have any parchment so I cut a paper bag to size and it work well.

Thank you Smitten Kitchen for some direction.