Remy's Ratatouille
Thin rounds of courgette, aubergine and tomato, fanned over a roasted pepper and tomato sauce. The haute cuisine version of a rustic Provençal vegetable dish, exactly as it appears in the film.
- prep
- 45 min
- cook
- 1 h
- total
- 1 h 45 min
- serves
- 6
- level
- hard
In Ratatouille (2007), this exact dish is what finally cracks the stern food critic Anton Ego, a single bite sending him straight back to his childhood and a bowl of his mother's rustic cooking. On screen, the rat chef Remy builds it with impossible precision, vegetables sliced paper thin and fanned in a tight, repeating spiral.
That precision is real, and it's not Remy's invention: this is confit byaldi, a refined, deconstructed take on traditional ratatouille created by chef Michel Richard, which the filmmakers used because it photographed better than the usual rustic stew. Underneath the technique, it's still the same vegetables, cooked low and slow until completely tender.
Part of our 40 famous movie foods list.
method
For the piperade base, heat 2 tbsp olive oil in a pan, and soften the onion and garlic for 5 minutes.
Add the roasted peppers and crushed tomatoes, and simmer for 15 minutes with the thyme, until thickened. Remove the thyme, season, and blend until smooth. Spread this sauce in the base of a round baking dish or individual gratin dishes.
Preheat the oven to 160°C (320°F).
Using a mandoline or a very sharp knife, slice the courgette, eggplant and tomato into very thin, even rounds, as thin as you can manage.
Arrange the slices in a tightly overlapping spiral or fan pattern over the sauce, alternating courgette, eggplant and tomato in a repeating sequence.
Drizzle with the remaining olive oil, season with salt and pepper, and cover with parchment paper cut to fit directly on top of the vegetables.
Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, until the vegetables are completely tender.
Remove the parchment, and if you like a little color, finish uncovered under a broiler for a few minutes.
Scatter with basil, and serve warm or at room temperature.
chef's tips
- This precise, fanned arrangement is specifically confit byaldi, a refined version of rustic ratatouille created by chef Michel Richard and popularized by Thomas Keller, which the filmmakers used as Remy's dish instead of the chunkier, stewed ratatouille found in most French kitchens.
- Slicing the vegetables thin and even is the one skill this dish actually tests; a mandoline makes it far more consistent than a knife, and consistency is the whole visual point.
- The parchment lid traps steam and keeps the vegetables from drying out or browning unevenly while they cook low and slow.
- In the film, this exact dish is what wins over the critic Anton Ego, specifically because its first bite transports him back to a simple family meal, a reminder that the fanciest technique still has to taste like something real underneath it.