Garden Ratatouille with Herbed Polenta

This recipe is compliments of McCormick.com. I deviated from the original recipe in a few ways. First, I substituted sliced mushrooms for the eggplant and replaced the can of diced of tomatoes with one fresh tomato, diced. I forgot to add the balsamic vinegar. Finally, I served the dish like so: grilled polenta topped with goat cheese followed be garden ratatouille and homemade marinara sauce. I am glad I made this because it was delicious. I served this with McCormick's Edamame and Corn Salad with Oregano Vinegarette. It was a nice pairing and we will definitely make this again. Thanks McCormick!!

The leftovers of the ratatouille can be recycled into a garden vegetable sandwich (similar to the Eggplant Caponata one that I have made before). Toast your bread. Heat up your ratatouille. Place stuffing inside topped with mozzarella cheese or goat cheese and close your sandwich. Yummy!!

Patatas Bravas (Crispy Spiced Potatoes)

3 potatoes
1/2 onion, diced
1 tsp garlic paste (or 2 cloves)
1/2 tsp red chili powder
Salt and black pepper to taste
1 tbsp butter (optional)
2 tbsp olive oil
Chopped cilantro

For sauce:
1 tbsp Tabasco sauce
1 tbsp mayo
1 tbsp ketchup
Salt and black pepper to taste
Chopped cilantro


1. Let's make the sauce first. Mix 1 tbsp of Tabasco sauce with the ketchup and mayo, a pinch of salt and black pepper and a little bit of chopped cilantro. Mix together and set aside.
2. Place one potato at a time in a brown paper bag to cook in microwave. I used a paper towel since I did not have the paper bag. Cook for about 3 minutes in the microwave. When cools down, peel the potatoes and chop into one inch cubes.
3. Heat oil in pan. Add the onions and sautee until soft. Then add the garlic and continue to sautee. Add the salt, red chili powder and black pepper next.
4. Next, throw in the boiled, cubed potatoes and mix together. Cook for a few minutes to allow the flavors to come together. Add about 1 tbsp of butter and you're almost done. Remove from heat.
5. In another bowl, mix the cubed potatoes with the sauce, garnish with chopped cilantro and serve hot.

The original recipe calls for the onions and garlic be sauteed and mixed with the sauce. I tweaked it a little bit to combine those steps with cooking the potatoes. The original recipe also calls for deep frying the potatoes, and I wanted to make it healthier, with less oil.

I made a version of this for breakfast one day, which my sister called "Country Style Hashbrowns". It's basically the same steps except no sauce, just top off with cheese right before removing from heat. It tasted great!! So, you get double time with this recipe- breakfast and dinner!! Enjoy!

Overall, there is room for improvement on this recipe. My measurements were a little off on the sauce, so I have to work on that. Otherwise, we would have this again ..

Our Experiments with Polenta

What is polenta? Good question. We picked up some polenta from Trader Joe's this weekend and madethese awesome little appetizers for a light dinner. The funny thing is that about a week ago, I passed the aisle and noticed the polenta, but the packaging looked too much like sausage that I didn't even touch it to look at the ingredients. Then, I go grocery shopping with my hubby and he picks up the very thing that I was afraid of. It turns out that polenta is simply ground up cornmeal. That's not so bad!! The recipe for this is pretty easy. .

1.We bought the log of polenta so cut half the log into once inch round pieces. (For two people, we needed 8 pieces). Sautee them in some oil until golden brown and crispy.
2. Chop some onions into thin long strips. Sautee those in another pan. Add garlic and salt. Then add the chopped spinach and cook until spinach wilts.
3. Grate some cheese.
4. Now, assemble like so : Lay down one sauteed polenta piece on bottom of plate. Top with a little spinach and onion action and a little grated cheese. Place the second polenta piece on top. Add some more spinach mix. Add a dollop of pasta or marinara sauce and finally some parmesan cheese.
4. Repeat as necessary for the remaining polenta.

The polenta bites tasted really good. I will take no credit for this one, though. B made dinner and the creativity credit goes 100% to him. It certainly makes for a great appetizer, though, and it doesn't hurt that it looks like it was made in a restaurant!


We still have the other half of the polenta. Here's another variation to the above recipe. Grill the polenta pieces the same as above. Instead of the spinach mix, we added grilled onions and peppers. Finally, we made some Southwest sauce by mixing mayo, vinegar, garlic and some red chili oil.

Assemble like so: Lay down one piece of the grilled polenta on plate. Top with the sauce, then with the grilled veggies. Place the other barrel of polenta on top and repeat the garnishing. This one tasted equally delish. Sorry, no picture, though, because they were gone too fast!

Spicy Gazpacho Revisited

We made the spicy gazpacho tonight so that we can enjoy it for tomorrow's dinner. It turned out perfect that we happened to have all of the ingredients. While we were making the gazpacho, we referred back to the old recipe from the last time we made it, and I realized that it was not completely accurate. Here is our second attempt. I say "our" because Bhavnesh helped me! =)

1 onion, chopped

4 small tomatoes, chopped
1 small cucumber, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
2 small green bell peppers, chopped

2 green chilies, chopped

2 tbsp jalapenos, chopped

2 tsp salt

1 tsp black pepper

1 tsp red chili powder

1 tsp cumin powder

4 big garlic cloves

1 lemon, juiced

Freshly chopped cilantro

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp brown vinegar

6 oz. tomato paste

24 oz. water

1. Dice all of the veggies, including the bell peppers, onions, tomatoes, carrot, cucumber, and jalapenos.

2. Process the green chilies. Crush the garlic cloves.

3. In food processer, add the green chilies, garlic, cumin powder, red chili powder, tomato paste and water. Process together.

4. Mix the chopped veggies with cilantro, lemon juice, vinegar, cumin powder and olive oil.

5. Add 1/2 of the veggie mixture to processor with chili-garlic mixture and process until smooth.

6. Mix the processed mixture in bowl with chopped veggies and mix everything together. Adjust seasoning per taste. (You will definitely need to add something or another. Lack of salt was the big thing for us, but you need it due to the amount of veggies we are adding.)

7. REfrigerate for a few hours (overnight preferably) to allow flavors to come together. Enjoy with garlic bread or Spiced Brown Rice Cakes!

Indian Stype Gazpacho+ Spanish Brushetta

For those of you who do not know what gazpacho is, it is basically cold Spanish soup. I had never heard of it before until I tried it for the first time when we were on our honeymoon in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. It was really good, so here's to a walk down memory lane ...

4 tomatoes, chopped
1 red onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 carrot, diced
1 stalk of celery, chopped (I didn't have so didn't add!)
1 cucumber, chopped
2 jalapenos
2 red chillies
6 cloves garlic
1 tsp cumin
1/2 cup tomato paste
4-5 cups water
Juice from 1 lemon
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
Salt and pepper to taste
1 3/4 cup red wine (I didn't have either so I added a little vinegar instead)

1. Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl. Stir well.
2. Using a hand blender, puree only a part of the mixture.
3. Chill for a few hours before serving.
4. When ready to eat, top with bread croutons and/or dollop of sour cream and/or chopped tomatoes,onions, cucumbers and bell peppers.
5. You can also eat with tortilla chips, but I made a tapa-like Spanish brushetta to eat on the side

For the Brushetta:

Few tbsp of olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 tomato, finely chopped
1 garlic clove
1 green chilli, finely chopped
1/3 cup robust red wine (I didnt have so added a little vinegar)
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt to taste
Fresh ground black pepper
Handful of chopped cilantro
Handful of kalamata olives, chopped

1. Heat oil in pan over medium heat. Add the onions and sautee until golden brown.
2. Next add the garlic, green chilli and salt and stir fry for another minute.
3. Add the red wine/vinegar and increase the heat to high, stirring until all the liquid is gone.
4. Then add lemon juice and cilantro and cook for another minute. REmove from heat.
5. SEason with salt and black pepper if needed.
6. Serve on toasted crusty bread spread with cheese and topped with sauteed veggies.