Ratatouille

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Ratatouille is a traditional French vegetable dish consisting of eggplant, tomatoes, onions, zucchini, garlic, bell peppers, and various herbs. This is usually served as an accompaniment, as I did to veal cutlets, but has also been known to serve as an entree.

Ingredients: For the eggplant, I used Italian eggplant, (Italian eggplant is smaller than American eggplant and usually less bitter), plum tomatoes, yellow squash, zucchini, yellow onion and garlic. I subtracted bell peppers and added cremini mushrooms and okra to the mix.

Preparation: For the eggplant, zucchini and squash: All were halved then quartered and cut into one inch pieces. The garlic is finely chopped. One large yellow onion: cut the ends, peeled, halved end to end, then cut into 1/8's. I blanched the tomatoes. When the tomatoes are blanched, the skin is easily peeled off. (Blanche is a cooking method that requires the plunging of vegetables, pasta or proteins into boiling water very quickly, until cooked, then removed and plunged into ice water to stop the cooking process.) The mushrooms were cut into 1/3rd's. For, the okra, I cut off the tops and a slight bit of the tips, then halve across (not lengthwise).

Extra Virgin Olive Oil was heated in a large saucepan, over medium. Next garlic was added. After a minute or two, I added all veggies to the pan, covered and lowered heat. Keeping an eye and stir often, I added fresh parsley, thyme and Herbes de Provence. In order to avoid the veggies getting mushy, you can do one of two things: Keep a close eye and do not overcook or prepare all veggies separately and combine and heat all together.  

FYI: I like to add red chili flake when I eat this.

American Style Healthy Stuffed Peppers

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 The Low Down: Stuffed peppers is a dish which exists in different names and forms around the world. Stuffed peppers in American cuisine is a dish where bell peppers (red and green), are typically filled with a stuffing such as ground beef mixed with breadcrumbs and/or cooked with rice, egg, herbs, spices, (especially paprika and parsley), and cheese. Recipes vary, but often include the following steps: removal of the seeds of the pepper, stuffing them, covering with cheese, and baking the combined filling until the peppers are soft. A sauce may be served with them, often a tomato sauce, but this, too, varies greatly.

Preparation: I decided to be health conscious and utilized ground turkey (instead of ground beef) and brown rice (instead of white rice) as the main ingredients. I started off by cutting off the tops of the peppers, and clean the insides. Next, I mixed the turkey meat with the brown rice that I have prepared beforehand. As the meat and rice are mixed, fresh onion, celery, parsley, paprika, salt, pepper, and garlic powder were added. In a large bowl, everything is generously combined by hand, then I continue to season by eye and taste. Notice, no cheese in this dish.

Next I turn on the oven to 375 to pre-heat. Once my meat and rice mixture is complete, I add it to the hollowed out peppers by spoon. Then, I puree fire roasted tomatoes and cover the stuffed peppers on top, adding a few chunks of tomatoes as a garnish and sprinkle with fresh oregano and basil.

Place the dish in the oven, uncovered. The peppers will remain in the oven for approximately one hour and fifteen minutes to an hour and a half.

Food For Thought: Green Jalapeno Tabasco is a great compliment to this dish.

Salsiccia Rigatoni

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Gimme Some Info: Salsiccia is Italian for sausage. So, here we have "Sausage Rigatoni". The word rigatoni comes from the Italian word rigati, which means “ridged” and is associated with the cuisine of southern and central Italy.

This is a fantastic family-style dish. Along with the pasta and sausage, comes sweet green peas, cherry tomatoes (although you can use various types of tomatoes as long they are in season, i.e, grape, campari and even heirloooms, but they would need to be on the smaller side), cannellini beans (which are white Italian kidney beans) and portabello mushrooms.

Preparation: To start this off, I added garlic and shallots to olive oil. Next, I browned the sausage, then sweat out the mushrooms. In the meantime, I am boiling the rigatoni to slightly less than al dente, set the pasta to the side and preserve a bit of the pasta water. Next, I add vegetable stock, pasta water, tomatoes, then cover with lid. A few minutes before the tomatoes are about to burst, I add the pasta, peas and cannellini beans (they add a great texture to every bite) and allow it to cook in the sauce. Once heated and tomatoes burst, I add chili flake, toss and serve.