We got moussaka at a Greek restaurant tonight. It struck me as
traditional and wonderful. I wondered why I never make it at home when
I like it so much and realized that it is because it uses so many pots
and pans. I need one for the tomato sauce, bechemel sauce, browned
burger, softened eggplant, potatoes, egg & cream mixture on top,
casserole dish for oven. Does anyone have tips on how to shorten this
list and still come up with a good traditional moussaka?

--Lia

>
>
>We got moussaka at a Greek restaurant tonight. It struck me as
>traditional and wonderful. I wondered why I never make it at home when
>I like it so much and realized that it is because it uses so many pots
>and pans. I need one for the tomato sauce, bechemel sauce, browned
>burger, softened eggplant, potatoes, egg & cream mixture on top,
>casserole dish for oven. Does anyone have tips on how to shorten this
>list and still come up with a good traditional moussaka?
>
>--Lia
when I make it at home, I make the meat/ tomato sauce all together. I also
Broil the eggplant instead of frying it, I found that if the eggplant is fried
it soaks up a tremendous amount of oil, and using the broiler does not change
the taste at all.

Eosie

"Julia Altshuler" > wrote in message
news:boGmb.23345$275.32637@attbi_s53...
> We got moussaka at a Greek restaurant tonight. It struck me as
> traditional and wonderful. I wondered why I never make it at home when
> I like it so much and realized that it is because it uses so many pots
> and pans. I need one for the tomato sauce, bechemel sauce, browned
> burger, softened eggplant, potatoes, egg & cream mixture on top,
> casserole dish for oven. Does anyone have tips on how to shorten this
> list and still come up with a good traditional moussaka?
>
> --Lia
>

There's a recipe for Shortcut Moussaka on epicurious.com but I'm not sure
how much of a shortcut it really is. You could use jarred tomato sauce
(with meat) and add some cinnamon to it--that would reduce one of your
steps. Then you only really need to do the bechamel, eggplant, and potatoes
(isn't the egg and cream mixture on top more bechamel?). If you can get
pre-made bechamel sauce, that would work, too.

Speaking of pre-made bechamel sauce, I've never seen it in North America.
When I lived in Japan, though, there was a lasagne package which consisted
of a small foil pan, lasagne noodles, a packet of bechamel sauce, and a
packet of tomato sauce. All you had to do was layer, squirt, and bake. It
was pretty decent considering it was the lasagne equivalent of Kraft Dinner.

rona

--
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Julia Altshuler > wrote in news:boGmb.23345
$275.32637@attbi_s53:

> We got moussaka at a Greek restaurant tonight. It struck me as
> traditional and wonderful. I wondered why I never make it at home when
> I like it so much and realized that it is because it uses so many pots
> and pans. I need one for the tomato sauce, bechemel sauce, browned
> burger, softened eggplant, potatoes, egg & cream mixture on top,
> casserole dish for oven. Does anyone have tips on how to shorten this
> list and still come up with a good traditional moussaka?
>
> --Lia
>
>

Take out! Seriously, many wonderful dishes only succeed after using a
multitude of implements. I don't think I'd try to cut corners, since it
still takes a considerable amount of time.

Wayne

On Sun, 26 Oct 2003 02:33:43 GMT,
Julia Altshuler > wrote:
> We got moussaka at a Greek restaurant tonight. It struck me as
> traditional and wonderful. I wondered why I never make it at home when
> I like it so much and realized that it is because it uses so many pots
> and pans. I need one for the tomato sauce, bechemel sauce, browned
> burger, softened eggplant, potatoes, egg & cream mixture on top,
> casserole dish for oven. Does anyone have tips on how to shorten this
> list and still come up with a good traditional moussaka?


Rona mentioned Epicurious having a shortcut moussaka recipe,
here it is: http://tinyurl.com/sdx3

I've tried it (although it's been a while) and it's pretty
good. Maybe not quite as good as the moussaka I've had at the local
Greek festival, but close. There's tons of comments attached to
the recipe, so you can see a lot of feedback and what various users
tried. It doesn't contain potatoes, but potatoes in moussaka is a new
one on me. That means nothing, however, since I'm no expert in Greek
cuisine. Good luck!

Ariane