Yasmin Khan's Vegetable Moussaka
and how to entertain invalids
August is always the ass-end of the summer. I try to go somewhere for at least a week because if I am home the whole month of August, it’s just thirty days of panic and Sunday-scaries when I realize the summer is almost over and all my grand plans have not materialized, and, after months of humid air, every place in the New York metro area smell like a foot. It’s inescapable.
August has been particularly long for the Decavore, who has spent most of the summer at home with his foot in a splint, then a boot, unable to walk or drive. He' used the time to learn Arabic, but at this stage he is bored out of his mind. He was hit by a car in June of 2022, and two rounds of surgeries have resulted in two successive summers on the deck in a lounge chair in his bathrobe, like something out of The Magic Mountain.
He’s spent a lot of downtime watching Arabic language tv shows, and, for yucks, every Bible movie epic he can find. There are a lot, and they are very fun to watch with the Decavore, who is, to quote his father, “the most naturally blasphemous person I have ever known.” These have included more recent films, like Scorcese’s Last Temptation and Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ, which aren’t anywhere near as entertaining as Ben-Hur, with Charleton Heston, or The Greatest Story Ever Told (“Greatest story ever told? C’mon- is it even in the top ten?”) which is actually quite boring but a great family game to see who can identify the greatest number of the 1001 Hollywood stars who make fleeting appearances in it. Then there is my personal favorite, Barrabas, with Anthony Quinn.
Ever the completist, I’m panicking, since it’s August, and we’ve just scratched the surface- for quick and easy reference, there is a wiki page that lists every movie depiction of Pontius Pilate (we started doing a bracket tournament of these and currently our finals feature David Bowie and Telly Savalas). My primary take away from all of these movies is that every one of these directors, from Scorcese to William Wyler, had the same Holy Pictures of Jesus that I had growing up. Absolutely no imagination there. And the boys’ takeaway was that there was no homework done on Jews by any of them. I guess there were no Jews in Hollywood for them to ask.
Time then for some Middle Eastern delicacy that is not too heavy in the summer heat. Yasmin Khan’s recipe for vegetarian moussaka is one of my all-star dishes. Yasmin is one of my favorite cookbook authors. This one comes from Ripe Figs, which celebrates the people and food of the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, and shares stories and recipes from the many displaced peoples who live in these countries. I highly recommend this cookbook- every recipe I have tried has been a hit.
Like the meat version, this moussaka does have a number of steps, including a béchamel, which can be a pain, but so worth the effort!
1 oz dried mushrooms (Yasmin recommends rather fancy ones—I have used dried shitake from my local Asian market)
olive oil
eggplant (~2-3 large eggplants- a little over 2 pounds) cut in rounds about 1” thick
1 medium onion finely chopped
3 big garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 1/2 lbs fresh mushrooms (I recommend cremini or baby bella) chopped into chunks
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp sweet paprika
2 tsp dried oregano
1 1/2 cups tomato purée
1 tsp sugar
1 1/4 cups finley chopped parsley
1 cup plain breadcrumbs
salt and black pepper
For the sauce
2 3/4 cups whole milk
1/4 cup salted butter
1/2 cup plain flour
1/2 grated parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp white pepper
1/8 tsp nutmeg
2 large eggs lightly beaten
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Rinse dried mushrooms and place in a bowl. Cover with very hot water and set aside to rehydrate.
Grease a baking tray lightly with oil, then add the eggplant rounds in a single layer and drizzle them with more oil and ¾ teaspoon of salt.
Bake for 25-30 minutes until soft. (I like to get the eggplant very dark).
Heat 3 more tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan over a medium heat. Add the onion and sauté until soft and starting to turn brown.
Add garlic and cumin and fry. Add fresh mushrooms, cinnamon, paprika and oregano. Fry for ~5 minutes.
Drain the dried mushrooms and add them to the pan with the tomato purée, sugar, parsley and 1½ teaspoons of salt. Cook for 5 minutes over a high heat to evaporate some of the water. Add breadcrumbs, stir well and take off the heat.
To make the béchamel:
Heat milk until just before it comes to a boil. Melt butter in another saucepan over a low heat, add flour and cook for 3 minutes, stirring frequently. Slowly whisk in the hot milk and keep stirring until you have a thick sauce. Then add the cheese, ½ teaspoon of salt, the white pepper and nutmeg, and whisk until the cheese melts.
Take the sauce off the heat and let it cool for 5 minutes before beating in eggs. If you want to assemble the dish later, simply beat the eggs into the sauce just before you start putting it together.
Arrange half the eggplant in the oven dish and spoon mushroom mixture over them. Add another layer of eggplant, covering the mushroom mixture completely, then pour over the sauce. Bake for 45 minutes or until well browned.
Leave to cool for 20 minutes. This serves at least 4 people with leftovers.
