Shepherd's pie is quintessential comfort food: saucy meat and a few vegetables topped with buttery mashed potatoes. On a cold wintery evening, it doesn't get much better than that. But there's a whole other world beyond the utterly traditional beef and potoato version of the dish.
Shepherd's pie (or cottage pie) came about when the potato was extremely cheap and abundant. It became an easy way to use up any leftover meat, and has evolved over the years to include fresh vegetables and gourmet cheeses. Shepherd's pie has come a long way, adapting to our changing tastes, dietary interests, and restrictions.
We found a few recipes we're excited to share with you today that reflect all of those changes, from a vegetarian version made with goat cheese mashed potatoes, to a buffalo chicken shepherd's pie.
When I make shepherd's pie at home, I'll often make a double batch and freeze the leftovers for a weeknight when I can't be bothered to cook. It can be a really wonderful clean-out-the-fridge dish, too, in that you can really toss in whatever vegetables sound tasty to you at the time.
Try a Recipe:
• Turkey Sweet Potato Shepherd's Pie - Food Network
• Spiced Parsnip Shepherd's Pie- BBC Good Food
• Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie with Roasted Garlic and Goat Cheese Mashed Potatoes - The Fig Tree
• Lentil and Wild Mushroom Shepherd's Pie - A Communal Table
• Buffalo Chicken Shepherd's Pie - My Kitchen Addiction
Related: Comfort Food: Shepherd's Pie
(Image: Martha Stewart)
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My favorite variant is to simply substitute ground lamb for ground beef in the traditional recipe, though I also like to switch up the root vegetables (turnip, parsnip).
I had shepherd's pie at a bar in Jersey City, but the meat/veggie mixture had balsamic vinegar in it!! such a great twist to the classic sheherd's pie, without going too crazy on us...
http://twopeasteenypod.blogspot.com/2011/12/merry-christmas-to-mr-p.html
Love shepherd's pie! This version has lamb, pepperoncinin and is topped with goat cheese mashed potatoes.
Technically shepherds pie should be made with lamb (lamb > sheep > shepherds) not beef. Pie made with beef is cottage pie. But, ground beef is cheap and abundant and ground lamb is not so beef has taken the place of lamb. I'm still disappointed when fake "traditional irish pubs" make their shepherds pie with beef; they could at least use the right name.
I like to make it with a pastry crust on the bottom, it gives the dish a nice variety of textures.
Shepard's Pie is traditionally made with lamb, and pieces of a roast at that. The absolute best is made with the remnannts of a whole lamb shoulder. Minced lamb stew works pretty well too.
Cottage Pie is made with ground meat, usually beef.
I make a veggie filling using lentils and mushrooms and caramelized onions. Moisten it all with rosemary and Guinness and top with cheddar-scallion mashed potatoes.
I like to put some worchestershire sauce and dried basil in my meat and veggie mixture, and bake it in my cast iron skillet.
Katlian + JudiAU...thank you!!
Shepherd's Pie is the best dish ever for those of us who belong to a CSA; you can put almost any vegetable in it and it will work. I usually top mine with Colcannon rather than regular mashed potatoes--it uses up some of those CSA greens and ups the nutrition a bit.
In Québec, we call Shepherd's pie «pâté chinois», chineese meat pie. It's made with ground beef, corn and mashed potatoes. It's quite popular! The pie has nothing chineese except it's name. The explanations for that vary, but the most popular one is that pâté chinois was what the workers on the pan-canadian railroad (mainly asian) would get to eat daily.