Spicing up the Sheperds pie..
A baked meat-pie dish topped with creamy mashed potatoes.
It’s been called Cottage pie as well, which actually pre-dates Sheperds pie by a century! Cottage pie is typically made from beef whereas sheperds pie is made from minced lamb, sheperd – sheep – lamb (See the connection 😉 ) Cottage pie was named such as potatoes were newly introduced and peasants (living in cottages) used it in their meat pies to bulk up the dish.
I also love the name of Worcestershire sauce – a good tongue twister for the kids and adults too. I call it wooster sauce ! The trio of veggies – onions, celery, carrots, is used in western cooking a lot, it’s called the “mirepoux”. Lot of technical terms but this dish is so-not technical, such a simple dish. .
There are quite a few variations to this recipe , as with any recipe – I have added my own twists to the recipe. I favour some indian spices to “zhuzh it up”. In Joburg, a very good friend of mine added potatoes to the base and topped it up with mince and more potatoes on top. She did this so that the potatoes would soak up the excess fat from the mince, however it makes the dish too dense. I cook the mince without any additional fat/oil and use the excess fat to cook off the veggies, just adding a tbsp of butter incase the veggies are not cooking enough. This seems to control the amount of grease in the dish. The spices(turmeric, chilli, coriander) and the cheese toppings are purely optional here, I love spice and kids love cheese, that’s all! 😄
Sheperds Pie
Ingredients
for the mince filling
- 500 gm minced lamb
- 1 big onion chopped
- 1 celery stick chopped
- 1 carrot chopped
- 1 tsp rosemary, thyme, parsley either dried or freshly chopped
- 1 tsp crushed black pepper
- 2-3 tbsp butter
- 1 tsp tomato paste
- 1/2 can diced tomatoes
- 1 cube chicken stock
- 1/2 cup frozen corn kernels
- 2 tsp worcestershire sauce or wooster sauce as I call it
- 1-2 tbsp chilli and coriander powder optional
- 1/2 tsp turmeric powder optional
- salt to taste
for the potato crust
- 2 big potatoes cubed
- water for cooking potatoes
- 1 tbsp butter
- 2-3 tbsp milk
- sprinkle of nutmeg powder
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1/4 cup mixed grated cheese (Cheddar, mozzarella, gouda) optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius
- Start by cooking the potatoes. Peel, chop and immerse the potatoes in water. Boil until it is fork tender. Drain and set aside
- In a heavy bottom pan, fry the mince until it turns brown and releases the fat
- Add the mirepoix ( trio of onion, carrot and celery) and cook until onion has slightly softened
- At this point, add some butter (optional) if there is not enough fat to cook the vegetables
- This is the optional step – purely for spicing up the dish. You can skip this and move on the next step if you prefer. Add the spice powders (turmeric, chilli and coriander) and fry for a minute or two until combined
- Add the tomato paste, canned tomatoes and worcestershire (wooster) sauce
- Add either the dried or freshly chopped rosemary, thyme and parsley
- dissolve chicken stock cube in a cup of water and add to the pan along with the frozen corn kernels. Combine well and let it simmer for 5-10 minutes
- Meanwhile mash the potatoes with butter, milk and salt and pepper.
- To assemble the pie, in a baking dish, layer the mince first.
- Add the mashed potatoes as the next layer. I prefer add scoops of the mash on top of the mince and then spread it out. This method is easier to spread the mash over the mince, else it ends up pulling up the mince when trying to spread over
- Top off with grated cheese and bake in oven for 10 minutes. For the last 4 minutes, turn on the broiler to brown the cheese
- Garnish with chopped parsley and serve as-is or if you wish a crisp green salad
Notes
- If the gravy is too watery, add a tsp of all purpose flour to thicken it up
- Add the potatoes in scoops when layering, it is so much easier to smooth it over the mince
- You can avoid the cheese completely. If you wish to not add cheese, simply run a fork along the potatoes to create small ridges. This will help it brown nicely.
