Vegetable stew in the oven

Very convenient, tasty summer-autumn stew, on which you practically do not need to spend time, because it cooks itself in the oven. There are no special requirements for cutting vegetables either; they are cut into large and arbitrary ones. In Greek cuisine, this dish is called "Briam", this is a very popular everyday vegetable stew that is cooked everywhere. It is based on summer vegetables: zucchini, eggplants, peppers, new potatoes, but you can throw all the vegetables in Briam’s house: young cabbage, onions, tomatoes, asparagus beans - all the “leftovers”. Ideally, no vegetable should dominate, especially not to be zealous with potatoes - this is not a potato casserole. Briam is often sprinkled with cheese at the end of cooking, and not necessarily with Greek feta, modern housewives use their favorite cheese, for example, mozzarella, goat. Therefore, our hard cheese, which is on hand and which you like, is also suitable. The special charm of this vegetable stew is given by olive oil and oregano, I recommend not to refuse them. When I bake Briam a lot of vegetables on a baking sheet, the stew should be juicy, but not wet. If the smaller ingredients can be baked in the usual form. The dish is served to the table and hot and cold.

Ingredients: On a large baking sheet (6 servings) 2 medium zucchini 2 medium eggplants 1 bell pepper 200 g white cabbage 1 medium onion 4 small potatoes 150 g of hard cheese greens (dill and parsley) 5 tbsp. olive oil 1 tbsp. vegetable oil for greasing baking sheet 1 tsp salt a couple of pinches of freshly ground black pepper 1 tsp dry oregano or italian herbs

Turn on the oven to heat up to 180 C. Large cabbage arbitrarily chop (I have a thickness of 1.5 cm, length of pieces 5 cm). Onions to clear, cut into thin half rings. Zucchini randomly cut into large pieces (I have about 1.5 x 3 cm). Bulgarian pepper arbitrarily chopped.

Chop eggplant like zucchini. Important: I do not salt the eggplants in this dish separately and do not pour out the juice from them, they have never bitter taste here. But if you get a “bitter” variety of eggplant, salt them separately, leave for 20 minutes and drain the juice, you can rinse the eggplants with water and then proceed with the next step of the recipe. Chop the potatoes smaller, not large. Potatoes are baked longer than other vegetables, so they need to be cut into 0.5 cm slices. Place all vegetables in a large bowl.  Salt (1 tsp), pepper (a couple of pinches), add dry herbs (1 tsp), pour with olive oil (5 tbsp).

Mix everything well. I shuffle with my hands, little by little, so that the vegetables do not fall out of the bowl. Cheese grate. For now, postpone. We will sprinkle cheese on vegetable stew, when it is thoroughly baked in the oven and is almost ready. Cover the baking sheet with foil. Brush with vegetable oil. Spread the vegetables on a baking sheet. Bake 40 minutes at 180 C. Then open the oven, sprinkle vegetables with cheese, raise the temperature to 200 C and bake for another 15 minutes. Stew is ready. Chop the greens. Sprinkle with stewed herbs. Serve a little cold. Briam is good both hot and cold.

Enjoy your meal!