Eggplant Moussaka (GF, DF)

This is the first recipe from Dr Hyman’s book “What the Heck Should I Cook?” I made and it is delicious. It’s pretty rich so I’d recommend adding some pasta to cut it since it’s very saucy. I used 1 lb of ground beef instead of 1/2 lb ground lamp and 1/2 lb ground beef from original recipe. This took me about 1.5 hours to make and I made it the night before as a meal prep so I could have a quick dinner the next night. The coconut bechamel sauce would also be really good in pasta alfredo.

Ingredients

Veggie Layers

3 Tbsp avocado oil

1 small sweet potato

2 medium eggplants, cut lengthwise into 1/2 inch thick slices

Meat Sauce

2 Tbsp avocado oil

1 large onion, minced

4 large cloves garlic, minced

1 lb grass-fed ground beef

1 Tbsp smoked paprika

1.5 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp pink Himalayan salt

1 tsp freshly ground pepper

1/2 tsp red chili pepper flakes

1 tsp salt

6 Tbsp tomato paste

1 tomato, seeded and chopped

2 Tbsp tightly packed chopped fresh mint

2 Tbsp tightly packed chopped fresh oregano

Coconut Bechamel

2 Tbsp ghee

1 cup almond flour

1 (15 oz) can full fat unsweetened coconut milk

1.5 tsp ground nutmeg

1.5 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1/4 tsp salt

2 large egg yolks

What To Do

Preheat oven to 425*. Spray large casserole dish with avocado oil.

Veggies: cut sweet potato into 1/4 inch rounds and set aside. Place eggplant slices and 3 Tbsp avocado oil in large shallow bowl and mix until eggplant is saturated. Sprinkle with salt and transfer to sprayed baking sheet, arrange in a single layer and roast until tender and browned, 35-45 minutes. Remove and reduce oven temp to 400*.

Meat sauce: heat avocado oil over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add onion and saute until tender, 5-8 mins. Add garlic and chili flakes for 5 minutes. Add beef, smoked paprika, cumin, cinnamon, salt and pepper and cook until meat is fully cooked, about 7 minutes. Add tomato paste and chopped tomato and cook until liquid has evaporated, about 7 minutes. Add mint and oregano, stir for 2 minutes, turn off heat.

Bechamel: In a saucepan, melt ghee over medium heat until hot, then add the almond flour, whisk constantly until fully combined. Whisk in the coconut milk and bring to a boil. Add nutmeg and black pepper and cook, stirring for about 5 minutes until mixture thickens. Remove from the heat and quickly stir in the egg yolks, one by one.

To assemble, cover bottom of the casserole dish with all the raw sweet potato rounds. Top with half the sliced roatsed eggplant, then half of the meat sauce, then half of the bechamel. Make three more layers with the eggplant, meat sauce, and then the bechamel on top.

Cover and bake for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake for an additional 20-25 minutes until the top layer of bechamel is lightly browned Let cool for 15 minutes before cutting.