Ratatouille

This was one of the dishes for Sunday lunch. And like most folks of this town our Sunday lunch primarily featured the biriyani ! It had been more than a month since we bought meat and so the biriyani had to be put on the back burner. The fabulous thing about working with what we have at home is that we do extend ourselves to use every bit of that which is available.

Not that I can complain or anything because we seem to have angel food foragers everywhere. So when a friend came across an opportunity to help a farmer in the hills sell his produce, she included us in the list of people on whose behalf she placed an order. Naturally it helped that we were all in the same neighbourhood because we had to keep our contact and travel to the barest minimum possible .

The box arrived and we called it the mystery box because we had no idea what each of us were getting.I opened it to find a riot of colours just staring me in the face. There was only 1 zucchini but it was almost as if it had caught some of the sunset on its way down the winding roads, the colour was of a yellow so bright that I wondered if the Asian paints shade card would have a name fitting enough to call it by. Then tumbled out carrots, rhubarb, broad beans, green beans , some fennel flowers and other herbs. all I could think of was about cooking that zucchini in a way which did not take away from that glorious colour.

🙂 One of the food movies I watched time and again with my children was the tremendously witty Ratatouille. Remy the rat, Gaston , Alfredo Linguine and of course the food critic Anton. The incredible story which talks about the simple notion that “anyone can cook”.The french accents , the sauces , the kitchen mayhem and finally the dish which won the day …RATATOUILLE !

It is so amazingly simple, full of flavour if you get the seasonings right. We did not have any bell pepper or mascarpone cheese at home ,to dollop over the top. You can even just do the layering with carrot , cucumber and onion if necessary. This is a fun dish .We served it for lunch with buttered rice and a broad bean salad and I have to honestly say that we did not miss the biriyani that day !

Since then we have made it several times and here are a few more crisp images of the delicious Ratatouille. hope it will tempt you enough to try.

Topped with micro greens (optional)