Yummy Ratatouille

I made ratatouille for the first time last Wednesday! It was pretty good, but a little too liquidy, so you will want to check the pot pretty frequently (I did not do this).

First step is to chop up lots of things - an onion, 3 garlic cloves, an eggplant, 2 zucchini, a yellow squash, 2 bell peppers, and 4 tomatos



Yummy cut things!



Put 1/4 cup of olive oil in a big pot and put all the veggies in (except the tomatoes) with a couple bay leaves and some thyme and salt and pepper.

Leave them in there, covered, over a medium heat, for 15-20 minutes.



Meanwhile, add some chopped parsley to your chopped tomatoes. Pretty!



Now that the other veggies have softened, add the tomatoes and parsley to the pot and cover for another 15-20 minutes. Be sure to watch it and uncover it when everything is soften enough, but not falling apart. While you're waiting, stick a baguette in the oven to make it nice and crusty.

Dinner!



It is finals time, which means that, if you are an English major, you are all done reading the assigned books for the semester and you can enjoy reading stuff for yourself. What I want to read most is Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke. I read it once last year and it was Most Excellent. If you enjoy alternative reality period novels that include magic, silly and cranky and pedantic English people, and novels that have fun and informative (lying) footnotes, then you should read this novel too. I happen to like all if these things, and I love, love, love stories that have parts set in Faerie. So this is what I'm reading now.

Enjoy with your tummy and with your brain :D