Tian of Vegetables
Vegetables are so much a part of our life that we always have a dish, if not two, nightly. This is a very simple and yet full of flavor, favorite French dish. This is how I present it or the vegetables that I prefer. However, you can add thinly sliced potatoes, eggplant as well.
Vegetables are so much a part of our life that we always have a dish, if not two, nightly. This is a very simple and yet full of flavor, favorite French dish. This is how I present it or the vegetables that I prefer. However, you can add thinly sliced potatoes, eggplant as well.
- Carbohydrate 0 g
- Cholesterol 0 mg
- Fat 0 g
- Fiber 0 g
- Protein 0 g
- Saturated Fat 0 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (128g)
- Sodium 0 mg
- Sugar 0 g
- Trans Fat 0 g
- Calories 0 calories
Step-by-step
- In a heavy cast enamel oval gratin dish, smear the butter all over the bottom and sides.
- Arrange the slices of zucchini and squash, alternating them. Leave some open space in the middle. Place the cut tomatoes in the middle of the dish.
- Preheat oven at 350F.
- In a small skillet with 1 teaspoon of olive oil, sauté the onion over medium heat until translucent. Add some fresh thyme while cooking and season with salt and pepper.
- When done, 5 to 8 minutes, gently sprinkle them over the zucchini, squash and tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper, fresh thyme and a generous amount of olive oil.
- Place in the preheated oven and cook for 15 to 20 minutes.
- Serve hot or at room temperature.
Ingredient lists rarely account for the moisture content released by summer squashes during baking. Slicing zucchini and yellow squash to a uniform thickness of one-quarter inch ensures they soften at an identical rate without turning into mush. Crowding the heavy cast enamel oval gratin dish traps steam, which prevents the essential caramelization required along the edges of the vegetables. Selecting a wide, shallow vessel exposes maximum surface area to the oven heat, allowing excess water to evaporate efficiently before the cheese or butter can scorch.
Variations demand careful calculation regarding water content. Swapping in standard baking potatoes or raw eggplant introduces dense starches and sponges that alter the baking dynamic entirely. Pre-salting dense additions draws out bitter or excess moisture that would otherwise drown the cherry tomatoes in the center of the arrangement. Maintaining the alternating pattern of the rounds while leaving that central cavity open is structurally necessary for proper heat circulation.
Sautéing the onions over medium heat for five to eight minutes requires constant attention to avoid bitter browning. Fresh thyme leaves stripped directly into the skillet infuse the olive oil with aromatic compounds that standard dried herbs simply cannot replicate. Distributing this onion mixture evenly across the vegetables provides localized pockets of savory depth without overwhelming the natural sweetness of the tomatoes.
Baking at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for fifteen to twenty minutes brings the dish to readiness without overcooking the delicate flesh of the cherry tomatoes. Pulling the gratin from the oven too early leaves the squash rigid, whereas over-baking collapses the visual geometry of the overlapping slices entirely. Allowing the finished dish to rest briefly at room temperature lets the remaining cooking juices redistribute through the buttered base.
