Ratatouille! The food not the movie!

We are really busy and very behind in the gardening and putting up of veggies and I am writing instead of canning so I must make this brief.

Last several days ago I stopped by the market to grab a few meats for dinner, as we have enough veggies. I bought several big boneless pork chops and they had chicken breasts, but one get one free so I did. One night we had the first few breast pounded out and stuffed with fontina and sage, rolled and grilled. The next we had breaded grilled pork chops (the recipe is on the website) and it is wonderfully juicy! Since I had the breading I went ahead and breaded up the squash and grilled it too.




Yesterday, I skinned and boned the rest of the chicken, cut it into strips and marinated in jerk sauce (also on the website). When we came from the garden at half past eight with a picking of tomatoes, eggplant, squash, basil, peppers, and cucumbers, I didn't have an inkling of what I was going to have for dinner, then it hit me! Ratatouille!



Even though we haven't had time to go see the movie, there is was right there in front of me, so in about 15 minutes (who needs 30 minutes), we had jerk chicken, ratatouille, grilled corn on the cob and cucumbers in vinegar! Summer time is great!

Grilled Veggies, Grilled Breaded Pork Chops and Stuffed Peppers

Everyone has their favorite pork chop recipe. We like them lots of ways. We have two go-to recipes. In the winter, it's pork chops with cardamom and carrots. It's slow-cooked, tomato & meat brothy, fall apart, bread dipping, soul-warming yummy. It summer it is breaded pork chops grilled.

If you haven't tried this recipe, check out the website. In fact, both recipes are there and are really good. They turn out amazingly good yet the recipe is easy and the cooking time fast. How can you beat that? I am amazed every time I try it, mainly because for the limited time it takes to prepare and cook, it it so juicy and tender! Try it with grilled vegetables. We had grilled peppers, eggplant, mushrooms, yellow squash, zucchini, and onions, all marinated in a bit of garlic and oil.

It's a no-heat-in-the-house recipe for warmer weather. It is dog-gone healthy, if you get lean chops. I could have some more right now!

Another night we had stuffed peppers. They looked so good in the pictures. Have you ever tried a recipe and your instincts told you that you should do it your own way, but instead, you thought, well, he is a well respected trained chef.....More often than not I change the recipe, but in this case I gave him (Michael Chiarello and his Tra Vigne cookbook) the benefit of the doubt and followed the recipe exactly. It was awful! The hint should have been that it was something his Mom made. His childhood memory of it clearly overrules his taste buds. The recipe calls for adding a substantial amount of water to the meat mixture to absorb the bread crumbs. What it tastes like it an under seasoned mush with a very strange texture we both found unpleasant. Even ours looked great.

Now I have to figure out how to rescue the remaining two without throwing the whole thing out. To be fair, it is the first recipe of his that I have absolutely not liked. It reinforced my belief that my instincts are generally accurate and I need to stick with them.

Adventures in the kitchen are always a learning experience, which is a good thing! I don't know why some people don't like to admit to having a bad experience. I say that's the way you learn as well as develop your tastes! You have to take the bitter with the sweet. Live and Learn!

Cheers!