Pastitsio

Long tubes laid the same way in a dish under a spiced mince and a set béchamel, with no vegetable in it anywhere.

Beef, Egg. Not vegetarian — contains beef, kefalotyri whose rennet the source does not name.

Ingredients

For the pasta

• 500 g bucatini or long macaroni
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 80 g kefalotyri, grated
• 30 g butter

For the mince

• 800 g beef mince
• 2 onions, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 400 g tinned tomatoes
• 150 ml red wine
• 2 tablespoons tomato purée
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 3 cloves
• 2 bay leaves
• 3 tablespoons olive oil

For the béchamel

• 120 g butter
• 120 g plain flour
• 1.2 litres whole milk
• 4 egg yolks
• 120 g kefalotyri, grated
• a grating of nutmeg

Method

1. THE TUBES ALL LIE THE SAME WAY and it is not decoration. Laid parallel along the dish, a cut portion holds together and comes out square; tipped in and stirred, it slumps on the spoon and the layers disappear into each other. Half the character of this dish is that it can be cut.
2. THERE IS NO VEGETABLE IN IT AT ALL, which is what separates it from the aubergine bake on this site. No aubergine, no potato, no courgette: pasta, meat and sauce. Anyone adding a layer of something is making the other dish.
3. THE PASTA IS UNDERCOOKED BY THREE MINUTES. It spends an hour in the oven taking up moisture from the mince and the béchamel, and pasta boiled to tender first comes out as paste.
4. Mince: oil in a wide pan, onion 8 minutes, garlic 1 minute.
5. Beef in over a high heat, pressed flat and left to catch before breaking up. Fried hard 10 minutes until browned and the pan is dry.
6. Wine in and bubbled away. Then tomatoes, purée, cinnamon, cloves and bay, and simmered UNCOVERED 40 minutes until thick enough to hold a channel behind the spoon.
7. Pasta boiled 3 minutes short of the packet time, drained, and turned at once with the butter, then with the beaten egg and grated cheese while still hot -- the egg sets around the tubes and is what binds the base.
8. Béchamel: butter melted, flour cooked in it 2 minutes, milk added gradually and whisked, then simmered 10 minutes to something very thick. Off the heat, cheese and nutmeg, then the yolks one at a time.
9. Build: half the pasta in a deep dish, LAID PARALLEL. All the mince, spread level. The rest of the pasta, again parallel and in the same direction.
10. Béchamel poured over and spread into the corners, then tapped on the worktop so it settles between the tubes.
11. Baked at 180C for 50 minutes until deep gold and set in the middle.
12. RESTED 30 MINUTES before cutting. It is better still after an hour and reheats in squares perfectly.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Greece · All recipes