Have you ever had this happen to you...
1.  You've just made something that you are mildly happy with,  like fish tacos or beef stroganoff or anything involving eggplant,  and within a few hours you happen across the perfect recipe for the exact thing that you just made.  I hate it when that happens.
What about this one?
2.  You know that your bike light is always attached to your backpack so you don't have to make sure it's there ahead of time.  You're ready to leave because if you don't go now you're gonna be late and low and behold your bike light is not where it should be and ten minutes later you still can't find your bike light... you run around swearing under your breath (maybe) and blaming any and everyone... and then you find it in your pocket... that totally sucks.
3.  And then there's the bathroom thing.  You know - you go just before you leave but because you had tea (or maybe a beer) about 15 minutes before that you have to go again once you're about 10 minutes down the road... frustrating.


Number one happens to me a lot.  I guess that it goes with the territory being a food person and all [can I just say out loud once that I have a problem with the term 'foodie']  That's kinda the bad news.  In my case, I usually find about 4 recipes that are 'PERFECT' and/or 'Make. This. Now. Or. Else.'  and/or 'This will seriously change your life' and inevitably I find them right after I've pulled something relatively mediocre but edible from the oven.  The good news is that this is not one of those recipes.  It's pretty good and I am pretty happy with it.  Except it got a little burnt which sucks because then you can't see the colours as much (burnt food = darkish brown colour).  Fortunately it still tasted good to everyone except Kid #2 who is making me a little Cra-Cra with the veggie thing.  He declared that the vegetables tastes sour and spent 1 1/2 hrs getting through half of his piece.  I stomp.  I fume.  I leave the room to cool off.  I come back and fume some more.  I tell him he'll never get cheesy noodles (our name for that crap that comes in a box) again and that maybe I'll never teach him how to bike on a two-wheeler.  I stomp some more.  He's gagged his way through two bites.  I mentally run through my list of reasons why my parenting is a failure.  I refrain from crying.  He gags through another piece or maybe two.  We finally go outside to continue learning to bike on a two-wheeler because the cheesy noodle ban I can live but the two-wheeler biking ban was always just a desperate and manipulative lie (add another thing to my 'Parent Failure' list).  We sit down at the end of the day and talk about how important eating good food is and how we want him to grow up big, strong and smart and he claims that he understands and promises to try harder.


Kid #1 ate her piece quietly and washed the dishes (apparently I was a successful parent with one of them)


Right now I'm in Vermont, on vacation.  Sitting outside in the middle of a sunny, beautiful afternoon hearing nothing but wind blowing through trees and a cold beer beside me, I feel like I'm an ok parent and can laugh (weakly) about the incident.  None of this changes the fact that this recipe is in fact a slightly-better-than-nice way to deal with the bounty of summer.  If you are so inclined, serve each piece with a drizzle of good olive oil and some torn basil.


Grilled Summer Vegetable Crostada adapted from Camilla Styles
serves 6
makes 1 large pie

1 med. eggplant, seme-peeled and cut into 1/2 inch thick long slices
2 med/small zucchini, cut into 1/2 inch thick long slices
1 lg red pepper, cut into 1 1/2 inch wide strips
2 garlic cloves, crushed
3 - 4 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
sprinkling of salt
600 g (about a cup) fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced
1/3 cup parmesan, freshly grated

Crust:
1 1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat or red fife flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
2/3 cup unsalted butter, cold and cubed
3/4 cup sour cream or plain yogurt

*Make the crust the night before or morning of*
For Crust:
Combine the flours, baking powder, salt and cubed butter.  Use a couple of knives or a pastry cutter (or apparently you can throw it all in a food processor - check the original recipe) and cut it all together until it forms a crumbly texture and none of the flour is still dry.  Add enough sour cream or yogurt to allow the mixture to form a ball that stays together easily.
Cover in a left over bag or plastic wrap and chill at least 3 hrs or overnight.
On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/8th of an inch thickness.
Place on a lined cookie sheet - there should be between 1 1/2 and 2 inches hanging over all of the edges.
For the vegetables:
Place the eggplant, zucchini and peppers in a large bowl.
Add the garlic, olive oil, worcestershire, balsamic vinegar and salt.  Coat the veggies completely and let them marinate for about a half hour.
Heat the grill to about 500°.  Turn the heat on the grill down to about medium.  Place the eggplant and zucchini on the grill and grill each side for about 5 minutes.  Remove from the grill.  Place the red pepper on the grill skin side down.  Grill until the skins are burnt.  Remove the peppers to a bowl (or paper bag) and cover with plastic wrap for a few minutes.  Meanwhile, place the grilled eggplant and zucchini on the prepared pie crust.
Preheat oven to 400°F.
Add about half of the sliced mozzarella around the veggies and sprinkle with a little salt and parmesan.
Remove the plastic wrap from the peppers and remove the skin (should just about fall off).  Arrange the peppers around the other veggies.  Add the rest of the mozzarella, another sprinkling of salt and the rest of the parmesan.
Fold the edges of the crust over the veggies.
Bake for about 30 minutes or until the crust is golden and the veggies aren't burnt.
Remove and let cool for about 10 minutes before slicing.