PERFECT RATATOUILLE | A Super Tasty Vegetarian Recipe!

Friends, today we are making this gorgeous ratatouille. It is the perfect recipe for all of your summer vegetables, including zucchini, eggplant, summer squash, onions, bell peppers, and tomatoes. Now, many of you may know of this dish from the very popular Disney Pixar movie of the same name, but a traditional French ratatouille is a bit different, and I will talk about that on this video as we cook together. All you need to know right now is that this dish is healthy, incredibly tasty, thanks to all of the herbs and that just delicious roasted flavor, and it's a great way to get more veggies into your diet. So, let me show you how to make it. To get started, you'll need to dice up half of an onion, grate one small carrot, and roughly dice three roasted red peppers, and this is all for the base sauce. Now, the version of ratatouille I'm making today is more similar to a French tienne that originates from Provence, and Thomas Keller's confit bialdi that was used in the Disney movie Ratatouille. It's a bit more artistic and showy than a traditional ratatouille, simply due to the presentation and layering of the thinly sliced vegetables. A traditional ratatouille, on the other hand, uses similar vegetables, but they're just diced, sauteed, and simmered into an unfussy rustic stew that some call a peasant's vegetable stew. Both versions are delicious, and if you'd like to see me make the traditional version, let me know in the comments below. I'll also say that while roasting the bell peppers yourself may be more authentic, you know I'm all about saving time in the kitchen, so I'm using jarred red peppers today. Heat about two tablespoons of olive oil in an oven-safe 12-inch pan over medium-high heat. Add the onion and carrot, and saute that for four to five minutes until it's softened, then mince four garlic cloves into the pan and stir that for another minute. Add one 14 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ounce can of crushed tomatoes, and while I'm using plain crushed tomatoes today, you could also use fire-roasted tomatoes if you like an extra smoky flavor. Add the chopped red peppers, two teaspoons of herbs de Provence, and if you don't have herbs de Provence, just use a mix of dried thyme, basil, and oregano instead. Then one and a half teaspoons of kosher salt and half a teaspoon of black pepper, though watch if your can of tomatoes already has salt added to it, because mine does not, and you don't want it overly salty. Give that a stir, reduce the heat to low, then cover the pan and simmer it for about 10 minutes while you're slicing up all of the vegetables. Now, in a perfect world, all of the veggies would be about the same thickness to make our lives easier, but that's not often the case, especially when it comes to eggplant. You can definitely use a regular thick eggplant, and I'll show you that in a second, but if you can find a Chinese or Japanese eggplant, that will be more similar in size to the zucchini, and you'll need just one of those. Use a mandolin to thinly slice the eggplant, and I'm using the second-thinnest setting on my mandolin, but depending on the settings on yours, it may be different. And once that's done, just set it aside. Now, if you were to use a regular eggplant, you can see that the rounds are far bigger, which would make the layering a bit wonky, but the easy fix to that is just to slice those extra-large rounds into quarters. Then each quarter is about the same size as a smaller round of eggplant or zucchini. And speaking of zucchini, that's our next veggie to slice up, and you'll need two medium-sized zucchini. I should also add that if you don't have a mandolin, you can, of course, use a knife to slice up the veggies as well. It just takes a bit more time, but either method works. Moving on to the next veggie, you'll need one yellow summer squash, because this dish is all about that vibrant color. Summer squash also tend to be a bit bulby, so if you need to slice some of those larger rounds into halves or quarters to better match the size of everything else, go ahead and do that. And then the last veggies to slice up are about five Roma tomatoes. And always make sure to be careful of your little fingers when these veggies get towards the end, because a mandolin is super sharp. But look at this beautiful assortment of vibrant, fresh vegetables. So let's head back to the stove for a second and blend up our base piperade sauce. You can do that by transferring the ingredients from the pan to a blender or by transferring them to a large jar or container and using an immersion blender. When I tested this recipe, I tried blending straight in the pan, but ended up splattering too much everywhere, so don't make the same mistake I did. This four-cup measuring cup is much better, and once that is lightly blended, add it back to the pan. Now, pro tip, if you want a cleaner edge on your pan, which I admittedly forgot to do while filming, go ahead and clean the edge of splatter before moving on to the next step. And now comes the fun part, which is stacking and placing all of the sliced veggies. There's really no right or wrong way to do this or a specific order that you need to take, but I stacked a zucchini, tomato, eggplant, zucchini again, then summer squash. I also like to stack several mini stacks on my cutting board before grabbing about three of them together to then place them in the pan. And the depth of the sauce should help them stand upright fairly easily, but if they tilt over a bit, that's totally fine. Repeat this process several times and keep placing the veggies in a circular pattern around the outside edge of the pan. Once that's done, you'll create another smaller circle on the inside, and then you're usually left with a little hole in the middle that you can fill with a stack of veggies. If you happen to have a few extra slices, you can always sneak a few more in if you happen to see gaps anywhere, but once you're done, it should look a little something like this. The last part of this recipe is the dressing, and you'll need about a tablespoon of finely chopped herbs. Any fresh tender herbs work, but today I'm using a mix of thyme and parsley. If you're lucky enough to have a garden with fresh herbs, just use what you have on hand. Add a quarter cup of olive oil to a small bowl, then add the chopped herbs and three minced garlic cloves because more garlic is always better, and then, of course, some salt and pepper to taste. Give that a stir and then drizzle it all over the veggies. Not only does this add flavor and a little pop of green, but it helps to give it that beautiful roasted color as well in the oven. Cover the pan either with a lid or some aluminum foil and then bake it in a preheated 375 degree Fahrenheit oven for 40 minutes. After that, you can remove the foil and bake it another 20 minutes uncovered until the vegetables are tender and the top is lightly golden. So essentially, you'll steam the veggies first, then let them caramelize a bit, which produces the most absolutely delicious melt-in-your-mouth ratatouille with deep roasted flavor. And if you're serving this up for guests straight out of the pan, you can add a few fresh thyme leaves on top for garnish. Now, if you wanna be extra fancy and try to serve it up Disney movie style, grab a ring mold or pastry cutter. You could even fold some aluminum foil over on itself and then loop it into a circle for a makeshift device. And this just helps with the stacking process. So fill that up with a bunch of veggies that are on end, then remove the device and hope to heck your veggies stay upright, and then place another small stack of veggies flat across the top. In the movie, they use a little chive across the top, but as I have fresh thyme on hand, I'll use that. And then add a drizzle of sauce around the edge for an extra fancy plating job, just like Remy's ratatouille. All right, not gonna lie, I am very impressed with myself right now that this all stayed put. And the funny thing is this little metal circular thingamabobber. I think I'd had this for more than a decade or probably two decades ago from when I was baking and I probably had this for pastries. Hadn't used it in so long that when I moved recently, I was like, do I need this? Should I throw this away? As I was cleaning my kitchen and I kept it for whatever reason. And now I think the reason was ratatouille. And now I'm gonna have to destroy my beautiful mound to do my bite shot. So let's dig in. So good. The vegetables are so tender. They almost melt together. I mean, it would be kind of cheesy to say they melt in your mouth, but they do. They're just really tender, juicy, flavorful. They get that roasted, herby flavor. They're sweet yet savory. I'm gonna get another bite. This ratatouille really is a phenomenal side dish. You can serve it with so many different things, but I would say tops on my list would be grilled or baked. Fish, chicken, or pork, all of those would be super tasty. And don't be intimidated to make this entire recipe even if you are a party of one because the leftovers are probably the best part. And there are so much that you can do with them. For breakfast, you can serve it alongside some scrambled eggs for a little extra veggie in the morning. Or what I would probably do is put it in a bowl and top it with some oozy poached eggs, which are my favorite, or six and a half minute jammy eggs. Then you've got your protein and your veggies and you are off to a good start in the morning. And if you're a vegetarian and looking for just a little bit of a heartier option, you can serve this over any type of rice or polenta. Sprinkle a little fresh Parmesan cheese on top. That is delicious. And yes, due to popular demand, I am sure I will do a traditional French authentic ratatouille in the future that is cubed and sauteed. That's the delicious vegetable stew. But for now, I hope you do give this sliced and layered version of ratatouille a try. Take a photo, make sure to tag me on social media whether you take a photo of this very vibrant and colorful dish, or if you are confident enough to try the stacked movie version, you get bonus points if you can pull that one off. I hope you guys enjoy today's video. And if you did, make sure to give it a thumbs up. Tell me how you would serve this up for yourself or for guests or friends or family. And I will see you again in the next video.