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Sausage tomato bake

Musaqqa'a

• 8 SAUSAGES
• 1 KG TOMATOES, peeled and quartered
• 1 TBSP ROSEMARY LEAVES
• 2 ONIONS, sliced
• 2 CLOVES GARLIC, chopped
• 100 GRAM BACON, cut
• 1 TBSP RED VINEGAR

• 2 LARGE EGGPLANTS, sliced
• 2 ONIONS, chopped
• 2 CLOVES GARLIC, chopped
• 100 GRAM CHICK PEAS, soaked overnight
• 400 GRAM MINCED BEEF
• 2 CUPS TOMATO JUICE

Fry the sausages until they are brown on all sides. Add the onions, the bacon, the rosemary and garlic and fry 10 minutes more on low heat. Add the tomatoes and bake the dish in the oven at 170 degrees Celsius for half an hour. Stir in the vinegar.

Stir fry the onion and garlic for 5 minutes in olive oil on low heat. Add the minced beef and stir fry 5 minutes more. Cook the chick peas 45 minutes. Sprinkle the eggplant slices on both sides with ample salt and leave them for half an hour. Rise them and pat them dry. Fry them until brown on both sides on high heat in olive oil. Arrange half in an oven dish, distribute the minced beef on top and spread the other half of the eggplant over the beef. Spoon the chickpeas on the eggplant and pour the tomato juice on top. Bake the musaqqa'a half an hour at 180 degrees Celsius.

It is clear that musaqqa'a, moussaka from Greece and moussaka from Cyprus are coming from the same family. The Greek and Cypriots make it a layered dish with béchamel sauce; the Arabs don't really layer it and use only tomato sauce. We will not fight about who was first. The Greek version is better known, but the word seems to have an Arabic origin.