Wednesday's moussaka

I had a bit of time to make tea as Matt was off on a rescue mission to his grandad's. I had it in mind to make a moussaka because I'd bought a couple of cheap aubergines at my favourite cut price supermarket the day before. Usually the only thing I do with aubergine is curry so the extra time available would be a good opportunity to do something a bit different.

Lots of recipe books tell you that you're supposed to do some sort of fancy thing with aubergines that involves salting them but I have never done this before and didn't intend to start now. So I just sliced them and put them in the griddle pan to pre-cook.

In the meantime I got on with the main sauce. I was working totally recipe-free (I have made moussaka before so did vaguely know what I was doing) and my main challenge was going to be qauntities. In terms of proportions I knew what I was aiming for so started off with an onion (well actually one and a half onions because I had half of one left over from something or other last week) and a couple of sticks of celery. Next were some some mushrooms that were starting to look a bit wrinkly.

That all started to cook down and I started to contemplate my protein content. It was unconventional but I had most of a tin of baked beans left over and decided to put those in. The tomato sauce would probably be sufficient liquid for the whole thing. I planned to augment the beans with some vegetarian mince but when it came to it I found that we only had a tiny amount in the freezer, so augmented further with some vegetarian chicken style pieces. I seasoned with some veg stock, black pepper and a good dollop of yeast extract.

So far everything was going smoothly (if a little unconventionally) so now it was onto the white sauce. I suppose the white sauce for a moussaka has some sort of special name but I'm not sure what that is. I started off with a good dollop of butter substitute and about the same of flour in smallish saucepan and cooked these for a little while. I believe this is called making a roux. Next I added milk and then I left this on a low heat to thicken, whisking occasionally. At least that was the plan.

The sauce resolutely refused to thicken. I whisked a bit more. It still resolutely refused to thicken. I left it for a bit longer. It still resolutely refused to thicken. I turned the heat up. It still resolutely refused to thicken. I lost patience and chucked in a spoonful or so of cornflour. I knew as soon as I'd done this that it was the wrong move. Cornflour can be a very useful thing but it can also be a very disastrous thing. On this occasion it was disastrous. I should have learnt from previous mistakes and made a paste with the cornflour before adding but as I said I had lost patience by this point. The cornflour immediately formed lots of lumps in the sauce, which despite vigorous whisking resolutely refused to disperse.

At this point I should probably have cut my losses and started again, but I couldn't bring myself to do this. So I put the sauce through a sieve to catch the lumps and changed strategies. I would thicken the sauce by adding thicker things – cheese and crème fraiche – and try the microwave – rather than the hob – for heating purposes. This seemed to be somewhat successful.

I took a break from the sauce and returned to the aubergine and beany stuff; having chosen an ovenproof dish of what I had deemed to be an appropriate capacity I layered these up, finishing with a layer of aubergine. Clearly I had underestimated the required capacity because the dish was filled right up to the top, leaving barely any space for the sauce. So I got a fish slice and squished the contents of the dish down as much as I could.

Back to the sauce which had now slightly cooled and I whisked in an egg. This makes it rise a little bit which is kind of cool. I carefully spooned as much of the sauce as possible over the moussaka, which wasn't very much of the sauce. Rather than waste the rest of the sauce I decided to add another egg and try to make some sort of soufflé things. Never having made soufflé before this was exceedingly risky. I was now quite tired so rather than faff around looking for the most appropriate container to make soufflé in I divvied it up into some fairy cake cases. I had no idea about temperature so put everything in the oven at 180°C and would keep a close eye on it all.

After about half an hour everything was ready, this happily coincided with Matt's (partially successful) return from his rescue mission. We enjoyed our moussaka with a side of broccoli. I think it's unconventionality made it even tastier. I didn't partake of the soufflé things (I don't like the taste of egg) but Matt assures me that they were nice (if a little bland). It was certainly entertaining to watch him munch them from their paper cases, and maybe I'll even try an actual soufflé some time.