Rouget and Ratatouille the Provencal Cooking Rhythm

A couple of years ago, we spent a transformative week in the historic hill town of Cagnes sur Mer, widely considered the ‘Montmartre’ of the South and long favoured by impressionistic painters for its alluring beauty. Within five (5) days we went from our hurried, busy lives to a more relaxed, slowed-down Provencal pace, hopelessly seduced by incredibly fresh seafood, perfect vegetables, and daily rounds of pastis and rosé.

Marseille’s Bouillabaisse

Our visit to Provence included an obligatory stop at Chez FonFon for traditional bouillabaisse in Marseille. Bouillabaisse is Marseille’s signature dish. However, a bit like the city that proclaims to be its birthplace, bouillabaisse is a riddle. Is it a stew or a soup? Is it a noble dish or peasant food? Was it created by the invading Greeks or by hungry fishermen? Is it even from Marseille?

“Eating bouillabaisse is a carefully choreographed religious ceremony, requiring 24 hours’ notice and preparation, whose consumption is performed in two sacred rites ending with genuflexion to the sacred cauldron.”

Destination Haut Cagnes Sur Mer

Our rental was in Haut Cagnes Sur Mer with views of the Grimaldi Castle and easy access to Vieux Nice. We spent our days exploring the area, shopping in local markets and cooking a la Provencal. One day, after following the seagulls, we bought some fresh Rouget (Red Mullet) from a local fish stand and I created this recipe for Rouget stuffed with Ratatouille. The recipe combines Provencal classics black tapenade, an olive and caper spread and ratatouille a mixture of stewed vegetables with fresh fish. For my presentation, I was lucky to find fresh zucchini blossoms, and as you can see from the photo the result is dramatic

Rouget stuffed with Ratatouille

Chef François de Mélogue

This recipe is a three-in-one combination of my mother's ratatouille and tapenade for a delicious stuffed rouget.

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Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 55 minutes mins

Total Time 1 hour hr 5 minutes mins

Course Appetizer, Starter Course

Cuisine French, Provencal

Servings 4 people

Equipment

• 1 stockpot all-clad with lid (6-quart)
• 1 food processor

Ingredients

  

1x2x3x

Tapenade Recipe

• 2 cups kalamata olives
• 4 tbsp capers
• 1 tin anchovies
• 8 fresh basil leaves
• 1/4 cup olive oil

Ratatouille Recipe

• 2 Japanese eggplants diced
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1 sweet onion diced
• 2 green peppers diced
• 3 zucchini (courgette) diced
• 4 garlic cloves mashed
• 4 tomatoes skinned and chopped
• 1 cup fresh basil chopped
• salt and pepper

Additional Ingredients

• 4 Rouget or Small Red Snapper remove head and bones
• 4 zucchini blossoms
• 3 tbsp olive oil good-quality

Instructions

 

Make the Ratatouille

• Submerge the eggplant in ice-cold water and let it sit for 10 minutes to remove any bitterness. After reading a cookbook on Japanese cuisine, I started soaking eggplant rather than salting, which I found works better.
• Heat olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed stockpan and sauté onions and peppers together over low to medium heat till softened and translucent, about 10 minutes.
• Drain eggplants well and add to onions and peppers. Continue cooking for another ten to fifteen minutes. The eggplant won’t be fully cooked but will be on the way.
• Add zucchini, garlic, and tomatoes and continue cooking on low heat till tender, about thirty minutes. Add basil, salt, and pepper and cook for 5 more minutes.
• If you want, drizzle with a really fruity flavoured olive oil and sprinkle on finely grated Parmesan. Even a poached egg served on top is incredible.

Make the Tapenade

• Drain your olives well. Put everything in your food processor and pulse to the texture you like. Yes, it is as simple as that. Tapenade has a long shelf life, although my tapenade never lasts more than a meal or two.

Rouget stuffed with Ratatouille

• Put 1 tablespoon of tapenade between the 2 fish fillets. Stuff one tablespoon of cold ratatouille into the bottom of a zucchini blossom. Put the fish into the zucchini blossom.
• Drizzle with olive and bake in a 450°F (235°C) oven for about 10 minutes.

Notes

This may seem a long and complicated recipe to some. To me, this is a quick and easy dish utilizing components I usually have already made. Both tapenade and ratatouille are great dishes to have laying around at all times. If friends stop by unexpectedly you can put a spoonful of tapenade on a cucumber slice or tartine and have a quick snack. Ratatouille makes a great light dinner or omelette mixed with goat cheese.

Keyword Peppers, Ratatouille, Seafood Recipes, Zucchini

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Additional Ratatouille Recipes:

Provençal Ratatouille Recipe

The traditional ratatouille recipe calls for vegetables to be browned in olive oil in a frying pan, each one separately, without peeling them at all. All the vegetables are cooked with their skins to preserve the maximum taste. Then, they are mixed and confit together in an earthenware casserole.

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Mama Régine's Ratatouille from Cassis Bistro

Ratatouille is a delightful aromatic casserole. This bright and chunky summer vegetable blend will compliment any roasted or barbecued meat dish.

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Ratatouille Tian Estival

This tian is easy to prepare. It can be served hot from the oven or at room temperature. This baked ratatouille casserole is a variation on the traditional Provencal recipe.

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Remy’s Ratatouille

This Cocoa & Lavender recipe was adapted from Thomas Keller's French Laundry cookbook.

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Saint-Tropez - Jewel of the French Riviera: Full day tour with a winery visit

Spend your day as a movie star in Saint-Tropez! The departure is set early in the morning to avoid the traffic towards the legendary town, with which a thousand stories are associated. The experience will start with a tour of this enchanting small fishing town of Saint-Tropez, which inspired numerous painters and whose beauty of the port always attracted the cinematographic world.

Book this Experience

Chef François de Mélogue

François de Mélogue grew up in a very French household in Chicago. His earliest attempts at cookery began with the filleting of his sister’s goldfish at age two and a braised rabbit dish made with his pet rabbits by age seven. He eventually stopped cooking his pets and went to the highly esteemed New England Culinary Institute, where he graduated top of his class in 1985. Over the next three decades he cooked in a number of highly acclaimed kitchens across the country, including Chef Louis Szathmáry’s The Bakery in Chicago, Old Drovers Inn, a Relais & Châteaux property in New York, and Joël Robuchon’s restaurant Gastronomie in Paris, before opening Pili Pili, his wood-fired Mediterranean restaurant in Chicago. In 2003, Food & Wine named Pili Pili one of the ten best new restaurants in the world.

Today, François lives in St Albans, Vermont, with his wife Lisa and their son Beau, the self-proclaimed family saucier. At heart, he is a storyteller who works in two mediums, food and light. In the kitchen, his stories unfold in slowly simmered daubes and simple, thoughtfully crafted dishes that express their seasonality in every bite. With a camera, they become quiet images of food, honest products, and the rural landscapes of Vermont and Provence. He is the author of French Cooking for Beginners: 75+ Classic Recipes to Cook Like a Parisian, a book that wanders well beyond Paris into the markets and kitchens of France. You can explore his photographic work at https://www.francoisdemelogue.com/ and follow his Provençal-flavored writings on Medium in his column Pistou and Pastis.