CEiMB: Cornmeal-Crusted Roasted Ratatouille Tart

I appreciate Ellie’s efforts, but I still don’t like eggplant.

This week the bloggers who crave Ellie in their Bellies worked on a roasted vegetable tart, built in a cornmeal and wheat flour crust. You’ll find the recipe here.  The combination of eggplant, zucchini and tomatoes, all roasted before being slathered with cheese and herbs and baked, really appealed to me. But the execution fell short. It’s still a bunch of winter vegetables that I really don’t care for. (But I ate it with a glass of this Michigan wine, which makes everything go down more smoothly.)

I shopped for this kind of on the spur of the moment – thus, without a list – and did pretty well. But I was baking in my pajamas early Sunday morning when I realized that I had forgotten the mozzarella.  I had two choices: get dressed and run to the store, or punt.

Refusing the change out of my pajamas that early in the day, I rescued some leftover ricotta from the back of my fridge. It worked like a charm!  It won’t melt and spread, though, so use your finger and a spoon to make tiny little drops of choose to dot each layer of the tart.  It’s super creamy when you bite into it, like lasagna, and makes the tart’s texture great.

I would be proud to carry this dish into someone else’s home, but I fear that the leftovers will sit in the back of my fridge for a while before we throw it down the garbage disposal.