Better Late Than Never! =)

Finally, the squash gratin recipe I've been wanting to post (because it's SO GOOD!)...
This holiday season is a triple whammy for me and my waistline. In addition to Thanksgiving, Chanukah, Christmas (Chinese food!) and New Years, I also did a lot of eating at a bachelorette party, a bridal shower, 2 weddings (one still coming up). Not to mention it's also Boyfriend's birthday. These are all delicious but they do not jibe well with the upcoming romantic ski vacation Boyfriend and I will be taking in 1.5 months! Eek! So.... I will be focusing on some healthy stuff now.

I decided to contribute one super-healthy dish for Thanksgiving this year and this was it. It was a squash gratin, composed of parts of several different recipes. It was definitely well-received and as my mom said "how can you go wrong when all your ingredients are fresh and delicious?"

Kids, this is NOT a low-effort recipe like some of the others I tend to concentrate on. It's especially hard when all you have to work with is a little grill pan. That smokes. And sets off fire alarms. This is especially bad when you do most of your cooking after 10pm and live in a large apartment building full of early-waking medical professionals!

Ingredients (serves 6-8)
2 medium zucchinis
2 medium yellow squashes
2 big tomatoes (or 3 vine-ripened ones)
1/2 sweet yellow onion
3/4 cup low fat shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
2 big handfuls of basil (chopped)

Preparation:
1. Slice the tomatoes into thin rings (1/4" or less)
2. Chop half the onion into thin rings (you can use more if you like onions) and sautee in a Pammed non-stick pan until brownish
3. Chop the zucchini and squash into about 1/4" rounds and grill on a grill pan (if you don't have a grill pan, just get them medium-cooked in a pan (or bake). Make sure to season all veggies liberally with S+P. Consider a spray of olive oil.
4. Chop the basil and combine with the cheese in a small bowl

_Take a casserole dish (square, round, oval, whatever you have on hand).

Layers 1+2

Yellow squash then onions

Make sure when you place down the yellow squash that the pieces overlap a little bit with one another in order to create a reasonably strong base.

Throw down the onions after the yellow squash pieces.

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Layer 3+4+5
Sprinkle on a thinnish layer of the cheese/basil mix to start the layers sticking.

Next put down a layer of zucchini similarly constructed as the yellow squash

Finally, lay the tomato slices over the zucchini. These don't have to overlap as much.

Sprinkle a layer of cheese over the tomatoes.

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At this point, each vegetable has been layered but if your casserole dish is small or you happen to have large vegetables you may have some slices leftover. Go ahead and make some more layers, you don't have to worry about order, just make sure you manage to sprinkle some cheese between every 2-3 layers.

For the final layer, alternate rows of all 3 vegetable types for a beautiful multicolored appearance. Sprinkle the top with a nice layer of parmesan cheese (or if you have any more cheese-mix left over, do that)

Pop it in the oven at 375 degrees for an hour prior to service. Make sure you can see some of the liquid bubbling underneath and hopefully the cheese will be just a touch brown on top. This thing is a huge crowd pleaser and has comparatively little cheese and SO MANY VEGETABLES. How can you go wrong? It's kind of like a healthy lasagna.

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Sorry I just can't resist, this is just so pretty and tasty, I had to put up another pic. Finally, how do I know that it was good? Because out of this whole thing, I only got to have 1 serving before it was all gobbled up. I was NOT given the leftovers of this to take home with me after thanksgiving. I took it as a complement =)

Already have another delicious new recipe on it's way =)
Until then,
Ciao!
Dr. Jules