Shepherd's Pie
If you’re like me, you know that glorious moment when you’ve successfully orchestrated the perfect ensemble of flavors from every corner of dinner plate into one majestic forkful. Ok, maybe I’m being a little dramatic, but wow do I love that moment. Now, image a dish designed to give you that perfect forkful with literally every bite. I present to you, the Shepherd’s pie. I’m not a Shepherd, and I’m not sure if you can consider this a pie, but title aside I am 100% on board. The creamy texture of mashed potatoes, the deep umami and sweetness of roasted/stewed vegetables, the cozy richness of caramelized meat (we’ll get back to that later), this is a forkful of comfort in every bite. Not to mention, the perfect way to warm your bones after a chilly day in the depths of winter.
In standard Grounded Grub style, we’ve explored some way to up the anty on sustainability as well as creativity!
In the vein of sustainability, we have some substitutions! Unless you’re able to find a small-scale local producer, we’re subbing out the butter in the mashed potatoes for a vegan alternative (we’re big fans of Miyoko’s). We’re also swapping out the standard ground beef for a meatless alternative (there are tons of options, but we find Beyond Meat and Impossible Burger to be the tastiest).
In the vein of a creative twist, in addition to the standard Shepherd’s pie, we’ve cooked up a variation that wraps the whole recipe up in a hand-held puff-pastry hand pie!
Ingredients
Filling
2.5 lb of Alternative Ground Beef : if you purchase pre-made patties as opposed to the package of ground “beef”, it is still totally usable, just be sure to break it up before and during the cooking process
2 medium Onions : White or Yellow preferred; diced
2 medium Orange Carrots : Yellow and Purple carrots can impart a slightly more bitter flavor; diced
2 large Stalks of Celery: be sure to use the entire stalk (green tops included); diced
24 oz of Baby Bella Mushrooms : sliced
½ cup of Frozen Peas
2 tbsp Tomato Paste
1 cup of Dry Red Wine : Marsala cooking wine will also work!
Kosher Salt: to-taste
½ tbsp Freshly Ground Black Pepper
1 tbsp Rosemary Leaves : chopped finely
1 ½ tbsp Thyme : chopped finely
1 tsp Red Chili Flakes
2 cups of Vegetable Broth
4 tbsp Olive Oil : other vegetable oils will work as well
1 tbsp All-Purpose Flour
Mashed Potatoes
3 lb Yukon Gold Potatoes: Russet will work as well, but Yukon Golds are preferred
¾ cup of Butter Alternative
1/2 cup of Cashew Milk or Cream: If you can’t find this locally or you want to make it yourself, this can be made at home by soaking Cashews overnight, then blending into a fine purée with some of the soaking liquids until a smooth cream forms. Additionally, if none of the options are available or feasibly, you can substitute for ¼ cup of Olive oil.
Kosher Salt : to-taste
Black Pepper
Puff-Pastry
We recommend only going this route if you’re also planning on making the traditional style Shepherd’s pie. The hand pies use a relatively small amount of the previously listed ingredients and it may be difficult and/or inefficient to shop for such small quantities.
4 Sheets of Store-Bought Puff-Pastry : In truth, it is a ton of work to make these yourself and take a quite a bit of practice to nail it
1 large Egg : whisked until smooth/uniform
All Purpose Flour : for dusting
Garnish
1 tbsp Chives : Finely chopped
Preparation:
If your puff pastry is frozen, be sure to place in a refrigerator at least 6 hours before using
Add 1 tbsp of oil to a large Dutch oven on medium-high heat. Once the oil is hot, add half of the meat and stir occasionally until it is well browned. Remove the meat (to a bowl or plate) and repeat with the remaining meat. If a residue forms on the bottom of the pot/pan from little bits of the meat sticking, leave it (unless its becoming black)! This will come in handy as an extra flavor boost soon.
Reduce heat to medium, add another tbsp of oil to the pan, and add all of your chopped vegetables. Cook until browned/caramelized and softened, approximately 10-15 minutes. In a separate pan, cook your mushrooms until they have shrunken and darkened significantly, then add them to the vegetable mixture in your larger pot.
Add your tomato paste and flour and mix well, cook while stirring occasionally for another 1-2 minutes.
Add wine, being sure to scrape up anything that has gotten stuck to the bottom of the pan/pot, mix well, and cook for another 5 minutes.
Add broth, all of your spices, the cooked meat, and your defrosted peas, mix well, and cook at a simmer until your mixture has thickened substantially.
Remove and place in a 3 Qt baking dish. If you plan on making the hand pies as well, place 3 cups of this mixture in a smaller bowl and refrigerate.
Add potatoes to a pot with enough water to cover the potatoes by at least 2 inches. Bring the water to a boil, reduce to a simmer, season generously with salt, and cook for 25-35 minutes (or until you can easily pierce the potatoes with a fork or knife).
Remove the potatoes from the pot. If you have a potato ricer or mill, you won’t need to peel them, but if you don’t, we recommend peeling the potatoes for a smoother mashed-potato texture. Half your potatoes (or quarter if you’re using russet potatoes) and mash/rice/mill until a smooth as possible.
Mix in your butter alternative, cashew milk/cream, and add salt and pepper to taste. They should be smooth and delicious on their own!
Set aside your mashed potatoes to cool. If you plan on making the hand pies as well, place 2 cups of this mixture in a smaller bowl and refrigerate.
Preheat your oven to 375ºF
If you plan on making the hand pies, now is your chance! The Pastry is the easiest to work with when cold, so prepare to work quickly!
Dust some flour on a large work surface. Unroll two of your puff pastry sheets slowly (if they are still very cold, unrolling them to quickly could result in cracking of the pastry) onto your work surface.
Use the back of the knife to lightly score the boundaries of 6-8 evenly sized rectangles onto one of the sheets. Spread roughly 1 tbsp of mashed potatoes in the center of each rectangle, leaving at least a half inch of untouched perimeter. Spread roughly 2 tbsp of the meat mixture over the potatoes, retaining that untouched perimeter. Take your whisked egg and a brush and spread a thin layer of egg wash over the open perimeters. Take your second sheet of puff pastry, place it directly over your first piece (with the filling). Then, using a fork dusted in flour (you will likely need to keep re-dusting it), press down on the perimeters until small divots form. Once all of the perimeters have been pressed together, use a pizza-slicer (or a knife) and cut down the seams until all of your hand pies are separated. Add more of your egg wash to the top of the pastries and cut 3 small holes in the top. Place onto a parchment-line baking sheet and place in the refrigerator. Repeat this process for the remaining two sheets of puff pastry.
Take your cooled mashed potatoes, and slowly cover the meat-mixture in the baking dish until you can no longer see any of the meat mixture. Once it’s fully covered, add the remaining mashed potatoes and smooth out the top gently.
Place your Baking Dish as well as both baking sheets of puff pastry into the oven. Remove the baking dish once the potatoes have begun to brown, and remove the pastries once they have puffed up and have browned significantly.
Let cool, add the chive-garnish to the pies, and enjoy!
Best Practices:
As always:
Avoid packaged produce, or really anything packaged for that matter. This is not to say that you’ll always have the option, but when you do, go for it! For example, you may sometimes see plastic-wrapped onions/celery/carrots/thyme/rosemary/potatoes. These are typically available without any packaging, so take the opportunity to use your hands, smell the produce, build that relationship with your ingredients! That being said, the meat alternative, butter alternative, frozen peas and baking ingredients for example, might be difficult to avoid without packaging. Pick your battles and fight them well!
Try to bring your own bags when you go shopping for these ingredients
Make sure you’re not buying more than you think you’ll reasonably use! Things like the flour, puff pastry, meat alternative, frozen peas, and butter will all last a while, so with those if you buy a bit more than you needed, you’ll have plenty of time to use them in the future. But with the produce and fresh herbs, those will go bad fairly quickly so buy with care!
These ingredients have been chosen with several things in mind:
Most of these ingredients are household staples that are relatively inexpensive and last a long time.
We have substituted meat and dairy butter for alternatives that have a significantly lower environmental impact in terms of water usage, land usage, and embodied emissions. If you are able to find a local, small-scale producer, we encourage you to engage in a dialogue with those producers and explore if there are ways that you can incorporate beef and/or dairy into your life in a sustainable way!
Did you try this recipe? Tag @groundedgrub on Instagram or Facebook and hashtag it #groundedgrub!