Mussaka

With all the fresh veggies come out of the garden, I decided to put something together that will utilize a few of them.... Moussaka came to mind. I have herd about this dish from Serge, an old Greek guy who sells tomatoes at the Portland Farmer's Market. I used to share my veggies with him at the end of the market day, and hearing him talking about all the wonderful Greek foods that made my mouth water....Today I am going to try one of the dishes he described to me, Moussaka, a dish that uses eggplant, potatoes, onions with meat and Béchamel sauce . I know the basic ingredients, now it's a matter of figuring out how to put them all together. I looked up on Youtube, and found a real simple version of it....

3 medium sized potatoes,sliced, 3-4 Black Dragon Eggplant,sliced, 3 cloves of garlic, 1 medium onion,diced, 1 lb. lean ground beef, 1/4 lb. Italian sausage. 1 jar of spaghetti sauce (16 oz.). Heat a heavy cast iron pan on high, add 2 T. olive oil brown potato slices on both sides, remove from pan. Add 2 more T. olive oil, cook eggplant slices until they turn soft. Remove from pan. Add Italian sausage to pan, cook until down; add ground beef, cook until done, add chopped garlic and onions, cook until onion turn translucent. Add the spaghetti sauce, stir until blended. Add some chopped herbs from your garden (I used parsley and oregano).

Spread a layer of the meat sauce on the bottom of a baking dish, arrange a layer of potato, a layer of eggplant, add meat sauce, add another layer of potato and eggplant. Pour the remaining meat sauce on top.

Make the white sauce: add 2 T. butter, stir in 2 T. white flour, stir until well blended and flour turning lightly brown, add 2 C. whole milk, salt and pepper, add 2 beaten eggs, cook until the sauce forms a nice consistency.

Pour the white sauce over the potato and eggplants. Bake at 350 F oven for 1 hour.

It was truly exquisite!