Noviice cooking moussaka
February 17, 2023 8:24 PM Subscribe
I cook infrequently, but I plan to make moussaka on Sunday. I think I'll use this recipe, but cut it down for a pound of meant. If I want to eat at 5 p.m., what time should I start? Do you have a better recipe, or any other suggestions?
Cooking and assembling the day before baking is absolutely the right way to make moussaka. Lasagne too. Bake time is way more predictable than prep time, especially for an unfamiliar dish, and both moussaka and lasagne will come out more delicious if rested in the fridge overnight before baking.
posted by flabdablet at 11:18 PM on February 17, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by flabdablet at 11:18 PM on February 17, 2023 [9 favorites]
I can see that I have looked at that recipe, but I'm pretty certain I eventually chose to do this one instead, from Serious Eats. As the others have said above, the prep time in your recipe is not realistic, and it was probably part of why I didn't go with it. I don't know if a professional chef but a home cook will more likely spend the 3 hours 30 minutes suggested in the SE recipe. Moussaka is project food.
The SE recipe is for a huge casserole. Cook it all and freeze what you don't use, or halve the recipe, it'll be just fine.
About cutting down the meat: the SE recipe has relatively less meat, but still more than you would like. I think it would be OK to cut it down a bit, but it would probably be best to try the recipe as written first, and then modify it next time you cook it. If you still want to cut the meat, add more eggplant.
posted by mumimor at 12:06 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
The SE recipe is for a huge casserole. Cook it all and freeze what you don't use, or halve the recipe, it'll be just fine.
About cutting down the meat: the SE recipe has relatively less meat, but still more than you would like. I think it would be OK to cut it down a bit, but it would probably be best to try the recipe as written first, and then modify it next time you cook it. If you still want to cut the meat, add more eggplant.
posted by mumimor at 12:06 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
In case it is not clear why people say this will take 3 hrs, not 45 mins - what is time consuming about things like moussaka is that you don’t just prep individual ingredients, assemble them and cook everything together once - every single constituent part is cooked separately, then assembled and then cooked again. So I think the 45mins of your recipe only counts preparing your ingredients, not cooking all the things prior to assembling and cooking them again.
If I didn’t want to spend the whole afternoon cooking I’d at least cook some or all of the components the day before. Get the meat sauce out if the way. Cooking that kind of sauce takes time because it gets better the longer it simmers and does its own thing. You can also freeze it so even if you want to halve the recipe I’d still cook all of it and freeze what I won’t use this time.
If you are baking the veg as opposed to shallow frying it you can get that going and then make your bechamel while the veg bakes. If you are shallow frying your veg you are going to struggle to multitask because bechamel needs constant stirring.
To get nice, durable layers you really want to assemble after everything has had a chance to cool.
posted by koahiatamadl at 5:03 AM on February 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
If I didn’t want to spend the whole afternoon cooking I’d at least cook some or all of the components the day before. Get the meat sauce out if the way. Cooking that kind of sauce takes time because it gets better the longer it simmers and does its own thing. You can also freeze it so even if you want to halve the recipe I’d still cook all of it and freeze what I won’t use this time.
If you are baking the veg as opposed to shallow frying it you can get that going and then make your bechamel while the veg bakes. If you are shallow frying your veg you are going to struggle to multitask because bechamel needs constant stirring.
To get nice, durable layers you really want to assemble after everything has had a chance to cool.
posted by koahiatamadl at 5:03 AM on February 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
A tip: make sure the eggplant is fully cooked, "hammered." IMO eggplant is only tasty when it is fully cooked.
Ditto flabdablet. In Greece, mousaka is often cooked before and lightly reheated. My experience in tavernas in Greece is food is not served hot (except fried food.) I've come to believe that dishes like mousaka taste better at that temperature. 100 - 150 degrees. And of course an assembled casserole like mousaka is easier to cut and serve after resting.
Note that outside large cities, homes often didn't have ovens. The cook would prepare a casserole--or a pan of vegetables, etc--and drop it off with the baker in the am. The baker would be finished with the day's bread but the oven would be still hot enough to bake these dishes. When the cook picked them up, he/she gave the baker a small amount of money. At least this is the tradition. I imagine there are still small villages in which the only oven is the bakers.
I recall on Mykonos waking early and roaming about. I saw the waiter from the place we ate the night before--wonderful lamb on the spit--taking a pan of pealed, cut-up, oiled and seasoned potatoes to the baker. This was from my first trip, probably 1981, so times have probably changed.
I've changed.
posted by tmdonahue at 5:13 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
Ditto flabdablet. In Greece, mousaka is often cooked before and lightly reheated. My experience in tavernas in Greece is food is not served hot (except fried food.) I've come to believe that dishes like mousaka taste better at that temperature. 100 - 150 degrees. And of course an assembled casserole like mousaka is easier to cut and serve after resting.
Note that outside large cities, homes often didn't have ovens. The cook would prepare a casserole--or a pan of vegetables, etc--and drop it off with the baker in the am. The baker would be finished with the day's bread but the oven would be still hot enough to bake these dishes. When the cook picked them up, he/she gave the baker a small amount of money. At least this is the tradition. I imagine there are still small villages in which the only oven is the bakers.
I recall on Mykonos waking early and roaming about. I saw the waiter from the place we ate the night before--wonderful lamb on the spit--taking a pan of pealed, cut-up, oiled and seasoned potatoes to the baker. This was from my first trip, probably 1981, so times have probably changed.
I've changed.
posted by tmdonahue at 5:13 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
I haven't tried them, but why not try a recipe from a Greek chef, such as
https://www.giorgostsoulis.com/syntages/kreatika/mousakas
or
https://akispetretzikis.com/en/recipe/1559/moysakas
I can recommend both of those websites generally.
There is no reason not too cook it in the morning. It is normal in Greece that baked dishes are cooked once and then portioned out over the next 1-2 days.
Good luck and let us know how it turns out.
posted by melamakarona at 6:44 AM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
https://www.giorgostsoulis.com/syntages/kreatika/mousakas
or
https://akispetretzikis.com/en/recipe/1559/moysakas
I can recommend both of those websites generally.
There is no reason not too cook it in the morning. It is normal in Greece that baked dishes are cooked once and then portioned out over the next 1-2 days.
Good luck and let us know how it turns out.
posted by melamakarona at 6:44 AM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
If I were making this for guests, I'd prep it beforehand - cook the potatoes, meat sauce, prep & cook eggplant, bechamel, assemble it, and put it in the fridge. Then bake 90 minutes before you plan to serve it, with time for a civilized glass of wine before hand. It would take a couple hours to do the prep & assembly. Recipes tend to underestimate the time for washing potatoes, chopping onions, and, esp., sauteeing onions. None of the tasks is difficult, there are just a lot of tasks. I hope you'll update after and let us know how it turned out. Bon Appetit!
posted by theora55 at 8:16 AM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by theora55 at 8:16 AM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Thank you for all the advice. I did do most of the prep work before, and I spread it out with breaks. I ended up using a recipe from my wife's Israeli cookbook, because I realized she wouldn't care for the custardy becamel.
My wife liked it more than my dad. (He is not an adventurous eater.) But it was salty, because I followed the advice of salting the eggplant first to make it not bitter (from https://www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/icooks/ask.html).
This dish has more steps than anything I've made yet! I don't know if I will do it again, but I did get a feeling of accomplishment.
posted by NotLost at 9:30 AM on February 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
My wife liked it more than my dad. (He is not an adventurous eater.) But it was salty, because I followed the advice of salting the eggplant first to make it not bitter (from https://www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/icooks/ask.html).
This dish has more steps than anything I've made yet! I don't know if I will do it again, but I did get a feeling of accomplishment.
posted by NotLost at 9:30 AM on February 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
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posted by computech_apolloniajames at 10:20 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]