RICOTTA CHEESE FILLED VEGETABLES

Second course

1 Bell Pepper
1 Eggplant
2 Medium Zucchini
12 oz Ricotta cheese
6 oz Parma ham, chopped
1 egg
1 tbsp parsley, chopped
nutmeg, salt, broth (optional)

Put a big pot salted water to boil. When it's ready add salt and cook the vegetables (whole) for 5 to 10 minutes.
Drain them, let them cool and then cut in half (lenghtwise) and take out seeds (for pepper) and pulp (for the other vegetables); throw seeds away, keep pulp.
When pulp is room temperature, chop and put it in a big bowl, add ham, parmesan, ricotta, parsley, nutmeg and salt (carefully because you already have ham and parmesan that are "salty").
Mix the ingredients, lightly salt the vegetables inside and fill with the cream.
At this point you have two ways to cook them:
- on the stove, in a skillet with a little bit of olive oil and some vegetable or chicken broth
- in the oven, in a pan with a little bit of olive oil as well and sprinkle with a mixture of bread crumbs and parmesan; cover the pan with aluminium foil an cook at 320 degrees, a couple minutes before ready, uncover it to get a nice crust on top.
Cooking time depends o the initial boiling, if you boil them 10 minutes, vegetables should be ready in 20 more minutes.
SUGGESTIONS:
You can eat them at room temperature, too.
You can freeze the when cooked and warm them in the microwave or in the oven, when needed.
You can prepare them in advance and cook them when you need them; in this case you have to keep them refrigerated for not more than one day (because of the ricotta, that's very delicate) or freeze them.