Low Carb Recipe: Moussaka

It's been a while since I've posted any recipes, so this is long overdue.  This moussaka recipe is a firm favourite in our house now and you get a good few portions out of it which survive nicely in the fridge or freezer until you want them (defrost before re-heating otherwise it's a real pain to heat through properly).

Serves 4:-

580kcal per portion - 17g carbs, 33g protein, 43g fat, 3.3 portions fruit & veg

• 1 medium/large aubergine (375g)
• 500g good quality lamb mince (500g)
• 1 can tinned tomatoes, ideally cherry tomatoes (395-400g)
• I big pile of (dark) green leaves - spinach/kale/cavolo nero (200g)
• 1tbps cornflour (15g)
• 4tbsp extra virgin olive oil (60ml)
• 1 small onion (50g)
• 4 fat cloves of garlic (20-25g)
• chunk of mature cheddar (60g)
• whole milk (300ml)
• 5tsp harissa paste (50g) - I use the delicious Belazu Rose harissa
• Pinch of cumin seeds.

0. Turn the oven on to 175C to warm up.

1. Slice your aubergine into slices around 3-5mm thick.

2. Heat a tablespoon of oil and fry the aubergine slices in batches, adding more oil as needed until there's about 1tbsp oil left from your 60ml.  (You'll need that for the meat later.)

3. Slice the onion finely.

4. Brown the lamb mince in batches with a little oil to start off with.  Oil will come out of the meat so don't worry it's not enough at the start.

5. Add the sliced onions once the meat is browned.

6. Blend the cornflour with a little of the milk until smooth, in a milk pan, then add the rest of the milk and some cumin seeds.

7. Heat gently and stir until thickened, then take off the heat and stir a couple more times.

8. Season the meat pan with a little salt and black pepper and some herbs if you like.

9. Add the tinned tomatoes and harissa paste and simmer for 20 minutes or so, stirring occasionally.

10. Spread half of the meat on the base of a baking dish.

11. Top with half of your green leaves.

12. Layer half of your fried aubergine on top of that.

13. Repeat with the other half of the meat, leaves and aubergine, then pour the white sauce on top of the aubergine layer.  Spread out evenly to cover all of the top so there's nothing sticking out to dry out later.

14. Grate your cheddar and sprinkle on top.

15. Place into the oven for 30-40 minutes until golden brown and bubbling.

16. Cut into 4 portions and serve/divide up into portions to chill for later.

My first green monster

For beginners (as in, this is very sweet and you can't taste the green veg -at- -all-):-

• 1x frozen banana (I freeze them in chunks for ease of blending)
• 1 scoop (25g) whey protein (MP* True Whey Cookies and Cream flavour)
• 200ml skimmed milk
• 40g baby spinach

Put everything in a suitable container/blender and blend to a smooth, thick paste.  I use a cheap hand blender (much like this one in the "under £20 price range", which I've had for over 10 years and used loads) and that works well.  Serve in a bowl - it's pretty thick with that frozen banana.  Top with something with a very different texture - in my case 40g of Dorset Cereals Tasty Toasted Spelt.

*

Soooo pretty.  But way too sweet for me; and too much volume.  I could go with a lot less banana and a lot more green leafy veg, which would make it a bit less thick and voluminous.  Not bad for a first shot though.

(* - you can get discounts off My Protein products from their website if you quote my reference number MP186248)

Noms and tri prep

The Pulp fruit puree was both good and bad.  Straight out of the pouch and into a glass and it doesn't look like much at all!

I squeezed the last little bit out of the pouch into my mouth and it was utterly divine.  Sweet and tangy with a distinct taste of strawberry and apple, but not so much the blueberry.  I then made a bit of a mistake and diluted it with water; probably a bit too much water and probably not mixed well enough as it ended up tasting like water with bits in and not very sweet or fruity.

So, for 1 of your 5 a day, this is a great option if you need to be able to transport it easily and not have messy peel, stones or cores to hang on to in your bag afterwards.  It tastes great.  But I'd say it's not so great diluted with still water.

Having run yesterday in a very respectable way, despite it feeling quite slow, today was about putting in a fast 400m to get used to swimming at a decent pace after Sunday's slow 5km.  And I whacked in 400m in 06:48 which isn't too shabby.  However, it's a short pool and that makes it a bit faster than usual due to powerful push-off at each end.  I'll need to whack in another run tomorrow (take it up to the full 5km) and another fast swim in the next few days and then it's tailing off and sorting out the nutrition in time for the bank holiday triathlon., probably one slowish run and one longer slow swim next week.

Dinner was a break from boredom again tonight; veal escalopes with lemon and garlic sauce with plain rice and egg florentine:-

Definitely needs more spinach in the egg florentine next time, but otherwise it was incredible!  The roasted garlic and lemon sauce was intense and perfect with the veal.

B - greek yogurt with 1 scoop, flaked almonds and blueberries
S - Dorset Cereals bar; 3 berries and cherries
*swim*
S - 1 scoop in skimmed milk and a Pulp
L - salad; lettuce, sweet pepper, cherry tomatoes, pomegranate seeds, capers and roasted chicken breast
S - banana and pistachio nuts
S - beef jerky
D - veal escalope, garlic and lemon sauce, plain rice and egg florentine

Exercise - 29 minutes swimming (including 400m time trial at the start)

Calories (kcal) [kcals to maintain weight (inc. exercise)	1913 2020]
Protein (g)	177.1 (37.8%)
Carbohydrate (g)	173.6 (34.7%)
Fat (g)	57.1 (27.4%)
Fruit & Veg	10.1