Ratatouille

(pronounced rat-uh-too-lee)

This is a French summertime preparation, made with fresh seasonal vegetables. It can be served cold with sesame buns or served hot with yellow rice.

Ingredients

3 tablespoons olive oil
pinch of hing
1/3 teaspoon black pepper
1.5 cups cubed eggplant
2 zucchinis, cut diagonally (into ovals)
1 cup bell pepper strips
2 Roma tomatoes (cut in eighths)
1 bunch fresh parsley (finely chopped)
salt

Preparation

Put the olive oil in a pan. Heat it up over high heat. Once it gets a little hot, add the hing and black pepper. Lower the heat a little and let the spices simmer in the oil. (This is different from when you do the same trick with Indian spices; here you just want to infuse the oil with the taste mildly, not fully roast the spices).

Now add in the eggplants and braise them (cook till the skin blisters). You'll want to cook them quite slowly, as this makes it taste best. Stir for a minute or so.

Having braised the eggplants, add in the zucchini. Toss in a little salt to draw water out of the zucchinis. Also, add the bell pepper strips. Stir vigorously. Cover the pot and let the vegetables "sweat" over a low flame for a few minutes.

Now add in a teaspoon of salt. Stir. Add the tomatoes, and then add in the parsley. Stir. Cover the pot and cook for about 3 more minutes.

Variations

You can add in a few olives when you add in the tomatoes; that works nicely.

If you are not used to bitter foods, you will probably want to degorge the eggplants, which means to remove their bitterness by rubbing them in salt and then soaking them in water.