Ratatouille

I recently started taking some online college courses one of which is Child Nutrition and Cooking. I thought it would be a fun class to take and might help me even further with my goal of helping to get my family to eat healthier. So when my first weeks assignment was to make a vegetable dish that could be served as a first course or a main course, consisted of three or more vegetables and was colorful I immediately thought of Ratatouille! Why you ask? Well one reason is Ratatouille is one of our favorite Disney movies and what better way to introduce a new dish to my son than one from a movie he loves and two I wanted to expand my vegetarian recipe box. I researched the recipe and found many different versions of it finding out that it is a traditional French dish of stewed vegetables. Some of the recipes I found called for layering it like a casserole while others prepared it as a soup or stew. So after much research this is the dish I came up with and it was a "BIG" hit with my little man! So " Bon Appétit" !

Ingredients 

1 Medium Eggplant Chopped
2 Small Zucchinis Thickly Sliced (I prefer small ones as they are less seedy)
2 Small Yellow Squash Thickly Sliced
1/2 of a Yellow Bell Pepper Chopped
1/2 of a Orange Bell Pepper Chopped
2 cups of peeled, seeded, chopped tomatoes (I used Roma tomatoes)
1 Medium Onion Chopped
2 Minced Garlic Cloves 
2 T EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) 
1 tsp of fresh Thyme
1 tsp of fresh Oregano
Sea Salt to taste  

In a large pot over medium heat add EVOO. Once hot add the onions and garlic. Cook until the onions are slightly translucent. Next add the eggplant making sure to stir on occasion till the eggplant is partially cooked about 6 min. Next add in your zucchini, yellow squash, peppers, thyme and oregano, continue to cook for about 10 minutes. Next add your tomatoes and salt to taste and cook for about 15 minutes to allow it to cook down. Then serve hot by itself or you can serve it with brown rice as I did here.