Don't tell me I can't do that - or a slight case of masochism

I swear, I'm not forgetting the main focus of this blog - easy, everyday recipes. But every once in a while, I do get ambitious. It's not really my fault, you see, I can't help it. When someone tells m "oh, this is just so complicated, I'd never do that !", I have to try it out for myself. Happily, this is something I share with my wonderful husband, who has become a master in puff pastry, cream puffs and a lot of other things I deem too complicated to make myself.

This time, it was my mother telling me about a fried eggplant dish a friend of hers does. I love eggplant. I had eggplant in the fridge that was a tad overdue. I also had zucchini, canned tomatoes, and motivation. This is what came out of it.

Fried eggplant and zucchini

5 eggplants

8 zucchinis

2 cups canned tomatoes or tomato paste

a lot of oil

kitchen paper

Wash the eggplant and zucchini, cut them into really thin slices (1/8 inch if you can). Pat them dry.

In one (or better : two or three) large flat cooking pan, pre-heat enough oil to cover the bottom of the pan. When the oil is hot (but not smoking), place zucchini and eggplant slices flat on the bottom of the pan. Cook them until the underside is lightly golden, Flip the slices onto the other side, cook until golden. Place the slice onto kitchen paper to absorb the excess oil. Repeat until all slices have been cooked - you might need to add more oil to the pan(s) between batches.

In a large oven-proof dish, alternate one layer of fried vegetables and one layer of tomato. Place in the oven (around 360°F) for 10 minutes, just enough for the tastes to infuse... and for the first slices you fried to be reheated.

Now, that took about two hours to make. After I was done, half of the kitchen was greasy and needed a good clean-up. And I can't say it's a light dish. But I must admit, it was quite tasty. Would I make it again ? Probably not, as my body sent me a very clear message "hey ! You know that lactose thing ? We think fat is just the same as lactose !"

On eating a female gardener

What ? Cannibalism ?

Not really. Just a simple jardinière, a tasty plate of spring vegetables.

Jardinière de légumes

2 broccoli

8 carrots

1 cup frozen green peas (I admit it, they take too long to prepare fresh, so I mostly buy them frozen)

3 potatoes

Wash the broccoli and cut it into small bits. Peel and dice the carrots. Put the broccoli, carrots, potatoes and peas into your trusted pressure cooker and cook for 20 minutes.

Peel and slice the onion. In a large cooking pan, preheat a good dash of oil and cook the onion until soft and lightly golden. Add the other vegetables, stir well and sauté everything for a few minutes.

I have been neglecting my blogs a little of late, I'm really sorry about that and I'll try to be more regular in my posts. I have some posts I want to make, but the crème brûlée is not playing nicely. I'm on my third try and still not 100% happy, drat !

First taste of summer

It's technically a summer dish, but the first round zucchinis appeared at our local market last week, and I couldn't pass them up. No big round tomatoes yet, though, so we just bought some small ones and added them to the stuffing. Usually, we'd carve those out as well and the juice and flesh would go into the stuffing.

It takes a while to cook, two solid hours. But it's worth it. It gets better with reheating, so my advice is to cook it in advance and reheat it. It freezes well - just reheat it in the oven for dinner !

Légumes farcis - stuffed vegetables

2 bell peppers

2 eggplants

5 round zucchinis (you can make do with long zucchinis, but they aren't as easy to stuff)

8 tomatoes

10oz ground beef

10oz ground pork

2 cups hacked stale bread

herbes de Provence (savory, thyme, sage, basil, rosemary)

oat milk

ground black pepper

Place the stale bread in a bowl and pour some oat milk over it. Stir from time to time until all the bread is soft.

Wash the vegetables. Cut off the top off the zucchinis and carve out their insides with a teaspoon (keep the flesh, don't discard it). Cut the peppers and eggplants in half, cut off and discard the stem. Carve out the insides of the eggplants as well. Place the hollowed out vegetables in a large pan with relatively high edges, with a dash of olive oil at the bottom of the pan.

Now take the flesh of the zucchinis and eggplants, dice it and add it to the bread mixture. Add the diced tomatoes, herbs, a good dose of black pepper. Add the meat little by little, kneading small bits of meat into the stuffing - the meat tends to stick to itself and not mix well with the remaining ingredients, so take your time to separate it into smaller bits and mix well. I haven't found a better instrument to do that than my two bare hands :)

Stuff the vegetables, replacing the "lid" on the zucchinis (and tomatoes, if you've found tomatoes big enough to use that way) after wards. If you have too much stuffing, either make little domes over the vegetables, or, if you really have too much, stuff the spaces between the vegetables.

Add a little water to the pan, just enough to barely cover the bottom of the pan. Bake in the oven, 390°F, for two solid hours, or even a little more. Serve hot with rice.

I don't have a set quantity of vegetables I put into the dish, I wash and prepare just enough so that the pan is full. You can pretty much adapt the recipe to other vegetables - onions, potatoes, small pumpkins in winter.

[insert movie title here]

I *adored* the movie. But I've loved the dish even longer. I know it's not perfectly right for the season, but Ihad those poor, sad eggplants in my fridge, the zucchinis were cheap and.. well, I just love ratatouille. As with all good stuff, the proportions are just a suggestion, make with what you love and what you have at hand !

Ratatouille

3 eggplants

4 zucchinis

10 small tomatoes

3 bell peppers (1 red, 1 yellow, 1 green, I love to get a little bit of each taste)

2 onions

Peel the onions, wash the other vegetables. In a large pan, preheat a small blob of olive oil. Don't be shy, it's not going to be much compared to the amount of vegetables anyway, and it tastes good ! Slice the onion and start cooking them, stirring regularly. Dice the eggplants, tomatoes, zucchinis, peppers and dd them to the pot as you go. Stir, stir, stir. Once everything is on the stove, cover the pot  and let simmer for 15 minutes. Then come back and check how much liquid has formed in the pan.  If there's too much juice, leave the lid off while the ratatouille cooks. If the quantity of liquid is right for you, then keep it covered. Cook until the vegetables are soft, then cook ad little more, checking the juice level now and then. It's not a soup, but it should stay pretty juicy.

It reheats well, either on the stove or in the microwave.

So where did the beets go ?

I haven't forgotten about this blog, I've just been... busy. As it frequently happens with two young children, friends coming over, and way too many projects on my hands.

A while ago, I posted about finding raw red beets. They've been cooked and eaten ! Here's how...

Potée aux betteraves (red beet stew)

2 red beets

about the same volume pumpkin

2 sweet potatoes

2 onions

1 saucisse de Morteau (a very large smoked sausage)

Proportions don't need to be precise, and don't hesitate to mix things up a bit !

Peel and slice the onions. In a large cooking pot or a dutch oven, preheat a dash of oil, add the onions. When the onions are translucent, add the diced Morteau (you can pretty much substitute any nicely salty, smoked or not sausage(s) )

Peel and dice the beets, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin and add them as you cut them to the pot. Stir some more. Add water until it almost covers the ingredients. Cover and let the stew simmer over low heat for.. a long time. One hour is a minimum. Beets take a long, long time to cook, and the more cooked it is, the better the stew will taste.

It is done when the vegetables turn to mush under the fork. And yes, it's very purple. Very, very purple. :)

Mama's note : mix it all together for a baby-proof meal. See background of the picture for proof.

Now, you can perfectly use pre-cooked red beets for this, the tastes won't mix exactly the same but it will be very good, too. I tend to prefer using my cooked beets in salads like say...

Winter salad, take 142358

1 red beet

1 endive

1 apple

1 handful corn salad

1 hard boiled egg

1 handful walnut

Dice or slice the vegetables, hack the walnuts and generally cut everything into small bits that can be easily mixed together. Yes, even the salad. If you're using something with bigger leaves like lettuce, pre-cut the leaves with your kitchen scissors - it makes for easier eating. Serve with a salad dressing made with a dash of walnut oil.