[food] Pastizio

[kaberett]

So a little while back my useless ex decided that there was a particular thing his grandmother used to make that he wished to recreate, and consequently dug out a recipe. I am blogging this partly so I've got it and partly in an attempt to provide him with handwaving on how I spice it.

Base Ingredients
350g macaroni for pastizio (strange long massive macaroni! apparently you can substitute penne or ziti)
110g feta cheese
2 eggs

For the tomato sauce
700g soya mince (ooooooor two packets, which tends to be 900g)
2 medium sized red onions (finely chopped)
2 cloves of garlic (chopped)
2 tins chopped tomatoes (is what we normally end up with)
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 tsp sugar
(a glass of red wine - would be tasty, we omit because there's never any at MUE's)
a bay leaf
1 cinammon stick ooooor like 2 tsp ground cinnamon (more to taste)
2 whole cloves
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp marjoram
oil for frying
salt and black pepper

For the béchamel
100g plain flour
100g butter
875ml milk (~1.5 pints)
2 egg yolks
100g Kefalotyri, Sainsbury's Basics Italian Hard Cheese, or other strong hard cheese
a pinch of nutmeg

First get your tomato sauce going. Onions and garlic in the oil til soft; add mince until the liquid's cooked off (if you're going from frozen) and it's starting to brown; then dump in everything else (except the salt and pepper, for the end). Leave to simmer.

Meanwhile make your bechamel and probably set your oven heating (~180degC). Melt the butter over low heat, stir in the flour until it's clumping and sticking together nicely, add milk bit by bit stirring constantly to avoid lumps. Once you've incorporated all the milk and brought it to the boil briefly (to make sure the flour's cooked), remove from heat and stir in the egg yolks, cheese, and nutmeg.

You are by this point ready to assemble your thing! Mix together the Even More Eggs and the crumbled feta. Make a layer of your tomato sauce, a layer of pasta, squoosh some of the eggy cheese around the pasta, add a layer of bechamel, repeat. Finish with a layer of bechamel and top with - if you're feeling enthusiastic - breadcrumbs and cheese.

Cook Until Done.

Please bear in mind that this is Not My Homefood so goodness only knows what horrors I'm perpetrating upon it, but MUE is happy with the outcome, so!

Comments

[umadoshi]

Ooh. Thank you!

[liv]

I do pastichio with fairly similar seasoning, but red lentils rather than soya mince. I also sometimes put veg in it, mushrooms and peppers, but I often put mushrooms and peppers into food. Not by any stretch of the imagination my ancestral culture; I think the recipe originally comes from Rose Elliot.