Since I haven’t talked about food lately and the only other thing I have to report is work we’ve done on the house–which, really, is a broken record. Here’s what I made for dinner tonight. I’ve made it before and it rocks. Pardon the grammar, I am tired.
Majorcan Tumbet
from: Food & Wine
Makes 5 servings.
1 1/4 pounds Italian eggplant, 2 eggplants
3/4 pound Sweet pepper (I forgot to buy this at the store so we did without)
1 pound roma or round tomatoes, cored and quartered
1/4 cup unpeeled garlic, rinsed
1 garlic clove, minced
1 1/2 pounds small Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and chopped, 1/4 inch thick
2 cans oil packed sardines, boneless and skinless, drained (I only had 1 can and I didn’t drain but used the ‘packed’ in olive oil
2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh parsley (we just chopped a lot of parsley)
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/3 cup water (didn’t add water to anything other than soaking the eggplant–which was more than 1/3 cup water)
olive oil
coarse salt & pepper
Preheat oven to 375.
Slice the eggplants on diagonal 1/4 inch thick. Soak the slices in a large bowl of salted water for 30 minutes. Drain and pat dry.
Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Core and seed the peppers and slice them into ring. Put the pepper rings on the sheet and drizzle with 2 tbs of olive oil and toss. Spread the peppers in an even layer on half of the sheet. On the other half of the sheet, pile the tomatoes and unpeeled garlic and drizzle lightly with olive oil. Bake for 45 min or until tender.
Meanwhile line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Toss the potatoes with a little bit of olive oil and spread them over the sheet in a single layer. Bake for 30 min or until tender but not brown.
In a shallow 6 cup baking dish, sprinkle the sardines with 2 tbs of olive oil, minced garlic and half the parsley. Let stand 10 minutes.
Heat 3 tbs of olive oil in a large skillet. Fry the eggplant over moderate heat until golden brown. Drain on paper towels. Work in shifts until all eggplant slices are fried.
Remove the sardines from the marinade and dust with flour. Fry the sardines in oil remaining in skillet until crisp–about 2-3 minutes. Drain well.
Rub the oily marinade all over the inside of the baking dish. Layer the potatoes in the bottom of the dish and season with salt and pepper. Layer the eggplant and peppers seasoning with salt and pepper. Scatter the sardines on top. Using a food mill, pass the tomatoes and garlic into 1 tbs of olive oil in a warm skillet. I just smashed with a potato masher because I was too lazy to get out the food mill. After mashing, we pulled the garlic skins out of the mix. I don’t mind tomato skins and seeds so those stayed in the mix. Add the sugar, season with salt and pepper and heat until thickened and slightly caramelized–5min.
Spoon sauce over the vegetables and sprinkle with remaining parsley. Bake for 30 minutes or until browned around the edges. I think ours went 45 minutes tonight.
Serve hot, warm or at room temperature.
Grate Asiago cheese to serve with. We also chopped extra parsley to toss on top of mixture.
We had an Australian Chardonnay with this meal and it went well. A “rustic” white is called for by Food & Wine. I don’t really know what that means and we used what we had on hand.