Ratatouille ( , ; ) is a French Provençal dish of

stew A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been Cooking, cooked in Soup, liquid and served in the resultant gravy. Ingredients can include any combination of vegetables and may include meat, especially tougher meats suitable for ...

vegetable Vegetables are edible parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. This original meaning is still commonly used, and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including edible flower, flo ...

s that originated in

Nice Nice ( ; ) is a city in and the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative city limits, with a population of nearly one million tomato The tomato (, ), ''Solanum lycopersicum'', is a plant whose fruit is an edible Berry (botany), berry that is eaten as a vegetable. The tomato is a member of the nightshade family that includes tobacco, potato, and chili peppers. It originate ...

, garlic,

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' , from Latin ), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus '' Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the onion which was classifie ...

, courgette (zucchini), aubergine (eggplant, brinjal),

bell pepper The bell pepper (also known as sweet pepper, paprika, pepper, capsicum or, in some parts of the US midwest, mango) is the fruit of plants in the Grossum Group of the species ''Capsicum annuum''. Cultivars of the plant produce fruits in diff ...

, and some combination of leafy green herbs common to the region, such as chives or

fennel Fennel (''Foeniculum vulgare'') is a flowering plant species in the carrot family. It is a hardy, perennial herb with yellow flowers and feathery leaves. It is indigenous to the shores of the Mediterranean but has become widely naturalized ...

Etymology

The word ''ratatouille'' derives from the Occitan ''ratatolha'' and is related to the French ''ratouiller'' and ''tatouiller'', expressive forms of the verb ''touiller'', meaning "to stir up". From the late 18th century, in French, it merely indicated a coarse stew. Modern ratatouille uses

tomato The tomato (, ), ''Solanum lycopersicum'', is a plant whose fruit is an edible Berry (botany), berry that is eaten as a vegetable. The tomato is a member of the nightshade family that includes tobacco, potato, and chili peppers. It originate ...

es as a foundation for sautéed garlic,

, zucchini (courgette), aubergine (eggplant),

, marjoram,

and basil. Instead of basil, bay leaf and

thyme Thyme () is a culinary herb consisting of the dried aerial parts of some members of the genus ''Thymus (plant), Thymus'' of flowering plants in the mint family Lamiaceae. Thymes are native to Eurasia and north Africa. Thymes have culinary, medici ...

, or a mix of green herbs like herbes de Provence can be used. The modern version does not appear in print until c. 1930.

Preparation

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

''s food and drink writer Felicity Cloake wrote in 2016 that, considering ratatouille's relatively recent origins, there exists a great variety of methods of preparation for it. The '' Larousse Gastronomique'' says, "according to the purists, the different vegetables should be cooked separately, then combined and cooked slowly together until they attain a smooth, creamy consistency", so that (according to the chair of the Larousse's committee, Joël Robuchon) "each egetablewill taste truly of itself." File:Ratatouille.jpg, ''Ratatouille niçoise'' File:20170329 ratatouille-debut-cuisson.jpg, Raw ingredients File:20170329 ratatouille-fin-cuisson.jpg, Heavily simmered and garnished with fresh parsley File:Confit byaldi 2.jpg, Small pyramid ( Confit byaldi)

Related dishes

Similar dishes exist in many cuisines. These include: piperade ( South-West of France), bohémienne ( Vaucluse), chichoumeille (

Languedoc The Province of Languedoc (, , ; ) is a former province of France. Most of its territory is now contained in the modern-day region of Occitanie in Southern France. Its capital city was Toulouse. It had an area of approximately . History ...

), tian ( South east of France), Confit byaldi (created by Michel Guérard), '' pisto'' ( Castilian-Manchego, Spain), '' samfaina'' ( Catalan, Spain), '' tombet'' (

Majorca Mallorca, or Majorca, is the largest of the Balearic Islands, which are part of Spain, and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, seventh largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. The capital of the island, Palma, Majorca, Palma, i ...

n), '' ciambotta'', '' caponata'' and '' peperonata'' (

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

), ''briám'' and '' tourloú'' ( Greek), '' şakşuka'' and '' türlü'' ( Turkish), '' ajapsandali'' ( Georgian), '' lecsó'' ( Hungarian), '' pinakbet'' ( Filipino), '' ghiveci'' ( Romanian) and '' zaalouk'' ( Moroccan). Different parts of the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographic region of Asia below the Himalayas which projects into the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. It is now divided between Bangladesh, India, and Pakista ...

have their own versions of winter vegetable stew.

Gujarat Gujarat () is a States of India, state along the Western India, western coast of India. Its coastline of about is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the List of states and union territories ...

makes '' undhiyu'',

Kerala Kerala ( , ) is a States and union territories of India, state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile ...

'' avial'' (with coconut and local spices), and Bengal '' shukto''.

In popular culture

In 2007, Walt Disney Pictures and Pixar Animation Studios released the film '' Ratatouille''. The film features Remy, a young rat with an exceptional sense of taste and smell who dreams of becoming a chef. The climax of the film sees Remy prepare the titular dish in the form of confit byaldi for the notoriously harsh

food critic A food critic, food writer, or restaurant critic is a writer who analyzes food or restaurants and then publishes the results of their findings to the public. Terminology "Food writer" is often used as a broad term that encompasses someone who w ...

Anton Ego, who unexpectedly loves the dish due to nostalgia for his mother's cooking of traditional ratatouille. The movie gave widespread exposure to this dish around the world.

References

External links