Mousakka

Hey all!  Happy Tuesday.  I'm a little overwhelmed by this week and everything I have going on.  I need to clean, pack/prep for my NY trip, hang out with my husband, work is busy, my in-laws decided they want to come visit next week....  It's just a lot going on!  Ever since we got Clyde, traveling has become pretty tough.  I'm still really anxious about leaving him, even though I think he'll be in good hands with my friend Michelle.  I'm still going to worry like crazy though...  Ugh...

Last night I did my usual walk around the hood with Clydester and then got in some much needed kitchen therapy.

I decided to try out a new recipe I'd seen when searching for eggplant recipes the other day.  This recipe for Vegetarian Mousakka, looked worth trying.  I changed a bunch of things, mainly grilling all my veggies and potatoes, so here's my version.

Ingredients:
1 eggplant, sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 yellow squash (or zucchini), sliced
1/2 red bell pepper
2 potatoes, thinly sliced
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
3/4 jar of tomato sauce (I used Classico Four Cheese)
1/2 can white beans
1 teaspoon dried oregano
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 a big log of goat cheese (crumbled)

Cheese Sauce:
1 1/2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups milk
black pepper to taste
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Grill eggplant, squash, red pepper, and potato slices.  I used my grill pan, lightly oiled.
In a skillet, saute the chopped onion and garlic in olive oil til softened.

Take a large casserole dish and coat bottom with a layer of tomato sauce.

Add a layer of grilled veggies, then crumble goat cheese all over the layer.  Add layer of potato slices.

Continue layering veggies, sauce, cheese, white beans, and onions, til all are used (kind of like making lasagna without noodles).

Place your casserole in the oven, covered, for 25 minutes.  

In the mean time, make your cheese sauce, by placing butter in pan to melt.  Add flour, using a rubber whisk, then gradually add milk, while stirring (you're making a bechemel sauce here).  Once thickened, add nutmeg, salt and pepper, and Parmesan cheese, stirring on a low heat. 

At 25 minutes, get your casserole out and top with the cheese sauce, then place back in the oven to bake an additional 25 minutes.

This will be VERY hot out of the oven, so attack it with caution!

It was great, and very much like lasagna without the noodles. 

Greg was a big fan and said I need to make this more often :)

I definitely think you could get creative with veggies on this one too.  Mushrooms would be great in this, and I really liked the white beans, and would even probably use more next time.  I was just using up half a can I had in my fridge.  I think it would also be good with ricotta subbed in for the goat cheese, or the original recipe called for feta.  I think any of those would work.  Anyway, you should try this, it's delish :)