Time for Greek cooking class at St. Barbara Greek Orthodox Church. This week's delicacy was Moussaka and Koulourakia. This post will be the Moussaka instruction.
This is Chef George Koutroumanis of Yorkside Pizza in New Haven. Chef George also hosts a local television show on WTNH once a month. He makes it all look so easy and I suppose it is when you just happen to whisk up Bechamel sauce for sixty day after day. Chef George brought in pre-baked eggplant and potato slices.
Now he's cooking the meat with onions, tomato sauce, wine and spices.
And layering the Moussaka. You can see we are all trying to translate "just a pinch" into weights and measures.
Back to the Bechamel Sauce. In this large quantity it took two people to make it. One to pour the hot milk into the butter and flour mixture. I love the picture below. I don't remember what it was that they were trying to figure out but it took three people to figure it out. It all worked and the Moussaka baked up beautifully.
From this below......
To this....
Very impressive.
After layering the potatoes, eggplant and meat sauce the final layer is the Bechamel Sauce. The trick is to pack down all of the ingredients before putting on the Bechamel Sauce.
Here's the finished pan of Moussaka. I travelled to Greece once in my life but don't remember Moussaka tasting so good. Chef George asked if we had any questions and I thought to myself, "Can I make reservations at Yorkside Pizza?" Next Friday will be my first time for making Bechamel Sauce...on my own.
This is Chef George Koutroumanis of Yorkside Pizza in New Haven. Chef George also hosts a local television show on WTNH once a month. He makes it all look so easy and I suppose it is when you just happen to whisk up Bechamel sauce for sixty day after day. Chef George brought in pre-baked eggplant and potato slices.
Now he's cooking the meat with onions, tomato sauce, wine and spices.
And layering the Moussaka. You can see we are all trying to translate "just a pinch" into weights and measures. 
Back to the Bechamel Sauce. In this large quantity it took two people to make it. One to pour the hot milk into the butter and flour mixture. I love the picture below. I don't remember what it was that they were trying to figure out but it took three people to figure it out. It all worked and the Moussaka baked up beautifully.
From this below......
To this....
Very impressive.
After layering the potatoes, eggplant and meat sauce the final layer is the Bechamel Sauce. The trick is to pack down all of the ingredients before putting on the Bechamel Sauce.
Here's the finished pan of Moussaka. I travelled to Greece once in my life but don't remember Moussaka tasting so good. Chef George asked if we had any questions and I thought to myself, "Can I make reservations at Yorkside Pizza?" Next Friday will be my first time for making Bechamel Sauce...on my own. 
Fun pictures.
ReplyDeleteGood luck.
And we can't wait to taste it!
ReplyDelete