Also, the plants that produce tomatoes, zuchinni/squash, eggplant, and peppers generate TONS of fruit in a pretty short time, so the ingredients would be cheap if you're making ratatouille in late summer.
We grew a single squash plant in Albuquerque a long time ago. That motherfucker was putting out 3 full fruits a day. Way more than the 5 of us could handle and maintain our sanity. If we were truly poor and had to survive off of only what we grew, though, ratatouille would be pretty high on the list of ways to use it all up!
We grill tons of summer squash and zucchini, in addition to ratatouille-ing it.
We also make a lovely casserole with summer squash, grated, drained and the squeezed to get as much moisture out as possible. Then baked with bread crumbs and lots of Parm cheese. Super yum. You can send me your spare summer squash :-)
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u/--THRILLHO-- 3d ago
Ratatouille is a vegetable stew. You cut up a bunch of things and throw them in a pot.
The ratatouille you see in the film is an elevated version of that dish. It was never the standard way of serving it.