Greek Moussaka Stacks topped with Yogurt Bechamel

Print the recipe here: https://www.dimitrasdishes.com/moussaka-stacks-individual-greek-moussaka-layers/

Ingredients
For the Meat Sauce:
1 pound (500g) ground beef
1 onion, finely chopped
3-4 garlic cloves, grated
15 ounces canned crushed tomatoes
1 teaspoon salt or to taste
freshly cracked black pepper
1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon or to taste
1 teaspoon dried crushed oregano
2 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
For the Yogurt Bechamel Sauce:
2 cups Greek yogurt
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 egg yolks
1 cup shredded Parmesan or Kefalotiri plus more for topping
freshly cracked black pepper to taste
a pinch of grated nutmeg
The Vegetables & Seasoning:
2-3 eggplants
4-5 Russet or Gold potatoes
salt to taste
freshly cracked black pepper to taste
olive oil
Instructions
Preheat oven to 425 °F, 220 °C.

peel the potatoes and slice them into 1-inch thick rounds. Place on a baking tray and drizzle with olive oil. Season both sides with salt and black pepper. Roast on the center rack for about 30 minutes or until fork tender. Set aside to cool.

Slice the eggplants into about 1 and 1/2-inches thick rounds. Place them on baking trays. brush both sides with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast in the oven for about 25 minutes or until fork tender. Set aside.

Make the meat Sauce: In a skillet, cook the onions in olive oil over medium-heat for 10 minutes or until soft and golden. Add the garlic and warm through until fragrant. Add the ground beef and cook it until no longer pink. Season with salt, pepper, cinnamon, red pepper flakes, add the tomatoes and a cup of water. Cook over medium-high heat until the sauce thickens. 15-20 minutes. Taste and adjust the seasoning if needed. Remove from heat and add the parsley.

Make the Bechamel Sauce: In a large mixing bowl, add all of the Bechamel ingredients and whisk together.

Make the Stacks: Begin with a layer of potatoes, top with shredded parmesan, an eggplant slice, a tablespoon of meat sauce, and then top with another eggplant slice. Dollop some Bechamel on top and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.

Reduce the oven’s temperature to: 350 °F, 180 °C.

Bake the stacks for 25-30 minutes.

Kali Orexi!

Music Used:
Greek Sun Time (With Intro)
ITEM ID: 66582698
By: tonyanthony

Its All Greek
ITEM ID: 84456733
By: LowNotes

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hi everyone Yas to another episode of demitra dishes today I’m going to teach you how to make a version of musaka which is a classic Greek recipe that’s kind of modern we’re going to make musaka stacks they’re little individual portions of musaka so easy to do and I’ll teach you how to do many of the steps ahead of time so if you’re serving this at a dinner party all you have to do is put it together that day and serve it another thing that we’re changing about it instead of making a classic bamal recipe where you cook the flour and the butter and the milk and all that kind of stuff on the stove we’re going to do a yogurt version that’s a no no cook no stove top version right it’s you just whisk everything in a bowl and you pour it on top and it’s going to be so tasty yet so easy to make let’s get started okay so we’re going to begin by making the meat sauce I’m going to finally chop an onion and add it to a skillet that’s heating over medium heat drizzle in some olive oil just two to three tablespoons and a little pinch of salt and cook the onion until it’s soft and golden that should take anywhere between 8 to 10 minutes once the onion is ready add in three garlic loaves that have been grated and just warm them through until they’re fragrant next we’ll add one pound of ground beef this is not lean ground beef so it is going to release some oil you can Brown the beef first if you want to get rid of that oil but I’m just going to leave it in there Brown the beef a little bit with the onions and the garlic until the pinkness is gone then we’re going to season it with some salt and freshly cracked black pepper a little pinch of cinnamon just a/4 teaspoon is all you need need to make it aromatic some crushed red pepper flakes if you want some heat and then I’m going to add a 15 o can of tomatoes these are crushed tomatoes just add it in there I also like to rinse the can out with a little bit of water just to get all the tomatoes in there mix everything all up and this is going to cook for about 15 to 20 minutes until the meat is fully cooked and the sauce is nice and thick once the sauce is ready turn the heat off and add a heaping teaspoon of dried oregano I also finally chopped some parsley that’s going in give everything a nice mix and you can also taste the sauce just to make sure it has enough seasoning if it needs anything else you could add it in at this point take it off the heat and set it aside while you get the veggies ready so peel four to five potatoes these are just golden potatoes rusted potatoes work too and then slice them so that way they’re around the same size that the eggplants are going to be sliced so they need to be about an inch thick then put all the potato slices on a baking pan drizzle a little bit of olive oil on them and season both sides with salt and pepper these are going to bake in a preheated 425° oven until they’re fork tender and slightly golden that’s going to take about 30 minutes so you can put those in the oven first while you prepare the eggplant cuz the eggplant Cooks a little bit quicker so I have two eggplants here I’m just going to slice them into rounds I’m not peeling the skin off and they’re going to be about an inch thick just like this they’re also going to all go I’m going to make them fit on this baking tray so I don’t have to wash one more thing and instead of drizzling oil on them I’m going to pour some oil out in a little bowl and I’m just going to brush each eggplant with the oil so that way they don’t get too greasy and they’re all covered in oil and I’m going to do this with both sides and season both sides with some salt and pepper and these are going to go in on the top roack and they’ll they’ll be fork tender in about 20 minutes keep an eye on them they might need five more minutes once they look like this they’re ready they should be nice and soft and fully cooked set those aside to cool a little bit so that way they’re easy to handle and now we’re going to make the bamal sauce so in a bowl over here I have two cups of Greek yogurt try to use Greek yogurt because it’s thicker and it’s just going to hold up better then I’ll add a half a cup of heavy cream to it two egg yolks and I’ll add about 1/4 teaspoon of ground nutmeg season it with some salt and freshly cracked black pepper and then I’ll just mix in one cup of either kealo or grated Parmesan mix that all up and set it aside and now let’s put everything all together and let’s make these stacks so I’ll use the same pan that the potatoes baked in cuz these are basically going to be stacked over the potatoes so why dirty one more thing right I’ll just smoth the smaller potatoes to the side so that way I work with the bigger potatoes first and I’ll start with the potatoes sprinkle a little bit of cheese on top of them I’m using parmesan and then I’ll add an eggplant Slice on top and about a heaping tablespoon or so of the meat sauce top that with another eggplant slice and if you run out of eggplants you could top it with a potato slice that’s fine and then I’m just going to add a heaping spoonful of the yogurt bashel on top sprinkle finish it off with a little bit of Parmesan cheese and I do have lots of potatoes ready so I’ll just stack these with the meat in between them I’ll just do one slice of potato on the bottom some of that meat sauce on top a potato on top the bashal and Parmesan these are going to go in the oven and the oven temperature I reduced it right now to 350° fah and they’re going to bake for about 30 minutes or until the sauce gets lightly golden on top the Musa Stacks are out of the oven and they smell the house just smells so cozy and comforting this has always been my favorite Greek dish to make brings me back to my childhood this and cabbage rolls something about those two dishes are the ultimate comfort food for me but enough about that let me tell you how to do some of the steps ahead of time so if you’re serving this for a dinner party you can prepare the eggplant slices the potato slices and even the meat sauce 3 days ahead of time meat sauce can actually be made a month ahead of time if you make big batches of it you can freeze it in containers and it’ll stay fresh in your freezer for a month or two and it’s a great thing to have on hand because you can use this meat sauce to make so many different things with it if you followed me before I’ve done many videos on freezer prep and things like that you can check them out later on I’ll put the links down below but you can also have the potatoes and the eggplants ready ahead of time too and then the day that you’re serving it you just put everything all together make that bamel that yogurt bamel and you bake it and it’ll be on the table in no time and you’ll have such low stress if you’re entertaining right because there’s so many things that we have to do if we if we’re calling friends over clean the house do all make other things desserts this and that if you have the stuff prepped ahead of time it’ll just make it so much easier if you don’t like eggplant some people don’t like eggplant you can do this as potato Stacks zucchini is a good substitute I think those are probably the two best substitutes I have some extra potato here and they’re just so comforting time to do the taste test and I’m a fan of eggplant and Musa so I I love it when I was little I didn’t though my my um mom and my Thea used to make it just for me half the tray with eggplant and the other half with zucchini because I didn’t like it but I like eggplant in this now so good the eggplant isn’t even bitter I usually salt it before I cook it I skipped that step because it was it was pretty fresh it melts in your mouth so do the potatoes the meat sauce is so good that bamal is slightly Tangy from the yogurt yet the cheese just makes it so flavorful give this recipe to try and let me know what you think if you prefer to make this in a big baking tray and serve it family style you can totally do that you don’t have to make it in Stacks like I did you can make the stacks and skip the bashal sauce and freeze them and then then bake them the day that you’re using them there’s so many options I hope you guys give this recipe a try print the recipe out on the website Demetrius dishes.com if you want to learn how to make a classic Musa click over here and I’ll see you right over there yes s