Red Ratatouille Risotto

Hi, this recipe is from 'Simple Recipes, Amazing Food, All Plants. BOSH!' cookbook, pg81 by Henry Firth and Ian Theasby. If you've never heard of BOSH! before, then I recommend that you look them up and watch some of their recipes on the TV or YouTube, where you'll find lots of tasty recipes to try. I got this book as a Christmas present and can't wait to try all of the recipes in it, so much so, for the next 4 weeks, I am only going to be cooking from the BOSH! cookbook. I thought this would give me the chance to explore the book and in January lots of people embark of Vegan-uary for the new year, so this may give them a few ideas to try as well.

This recipe was full of flavour and I really liked it, I thought that the red wine made it taste really nice, even if it's not traditional, the flavour was great. I also enjoyed the herbs in the risotto, it was seasoned very nicely. My parents did add some cheese to theirs, which isn't vegan, but apparently it was very nice, so maybe you could use some vegan cheese or another substitute if you fancied it. You could change the vegetables in this risotto to suit whatever you have in at the moment, for example pumpkins or squash, beans, maybe even sprouts might work. It wouldn't change the flavour much, it just wouldn't be ratatouille anymore. 

Enjoy!

Hazel :)

**

**

Dietary Info:

-Vegan

-Vegetarian

-Dairy-Free

-Contains Nuts

{Just don't add the pine nuts on top of your dish.}

-Gluten-Free

-Main Meal

Serves: 4

Takes: 1hr

Ingredients:

-1 aubergine (about 250g)

-1 courgette (about 200g)

-6 tomatoes (about 460g) {These are 'proper' sized tomatoes, not cherry tomatoes.}

-4tbsp olive oil {I would suggest using 4tbsp of oil from the sun-dried tomatoes jar for a more flavourful dish.}

-1 large red onion

-2 garlic cloves {I used 3.}

-5 sun-dried tomatoes in oil (about 50g)

-2 sprigs fresh rosemary {I used about 1+1/2tsp dried.}

-2 sprigs fresh thyme

-900ml vegetable stock

-2tbsp tomato purée

-225g risotto rice

-125ml red wine

-1+1/2tbsp dairy-free butter

-2tbsp pine nuts, to serve

-handful of fresh basil leaves, to serve

-salt and black pepper

Method:

1: Preheat the oven to 180℃ / 200℃ fan / gas 4 / 350℉. Line a baking tray. {Or a roasting tin, it needs to have lipped sides so the juices don't run into your oven.} Medium saucepan on a low heat. Medium saucepan on a medium heat. {I used a wok and a medium saucepan, wok for risotto as it had deep enough sides, and is more like a frying pan, making it easier to fry the veg before hand.}

2: Trim the aubergine, courgette and tomatoes and cut them into 2+1/2cm chunks. Put them all on the lined baking tray, drizzle over 2tbsp olive oil {Or from the sun-dried tomatoes jar.} and season with salt and pepper. Put the tray in the oven and bake for 40mins. {Until soft.}

3: Meanwhile, peel and finely chop the red onion and garlic. Finely chop the sun-dried tomatoes. Remove the leaves from the herbs by running your thumb and forefinger from the top to the base of the stems (the leaves should easily come away), then finely chop. {I didn't bother chopping the herbs because they were already super small.}

4: Place the stock in the medium saucepan on a low heat and keep warm.

5: Warm the remaining 2tbsp oil {From the sun-dried tomatoes jar.} in the other pan. Add the chopped red onion to the pan and cook until soft and translucent, about 10-15mins {On a low heat, you don't want it to burn.}. Add the garlic and cook for a further 1 minute. Add the rosemary and thyme, sun-dried tomatoes and tomato purée and give everything a stir. Cook for another 4-5mins. {You may need to increase the heat to medium-low / medium here.}

6: Pour the risotto rice into the pan and stir it around for 1 minute. Increase the heat slightly, pour in the red wine and stir until the rice has absorbed all of it. Now start adding the stock, a ladleful at a time, waiting until the stock has been absorbed before adding another ladleful (you might not need all of it). {Keep stirring the risotto for as long as you can, this releases the starch from the rice making the sauce thick and creamy.}

7: After 15mins, the rice should be 2-3mins away from being perfectly al dente. Take the roasted ratatouille vegetables out of the oven, scrape them into the pan and fold them into the risotto along with all their juices. Stir until the rice is just cooked. Remove the pan from the heat and add the dairy-free butter. Season with salt and pepper.

8: Divide between 4 bowls. Sprinkle over the pine nuts and garnish with fresh basil leaves.

While you're here...

I have a Pinterest for all my recipes, where you can save them to boards for the future and categorise them into different types of recipe e.g Sunday Dinners, picnic ideas etc. My account is @hazellikestocook, or find the link below. Also, I have a whole blog post explaining this in more detail here and https://hazelscookingandbakingblog.blogspot.com/2021/02/pinterest.html. 

https://pin.it/5xDvARk - my profile

This recipe:

https://pin.it/vEuw3pc