My New Favorite Comfort Food

Well, every cook has to have a flop every now and then. Calling last night's arroz con pollo a flop is perhaps an exaggeration and my co-workers and I greatly enjoyed it for lunch today, but I suppose it just didn't live up to my recent string of repeatable recipes. So, I am not sharing the arroz con pollo recipe here.

I was in luck, though...almost in the same moment I realized my disappointment in my dish, M called to tell me that a friend had given him some wild game sausage and asked if I was willing to cook it. He picked up some rigattoni, and we enjoyed an impromptu dinner of grilled spicy sausage mixed with rigattoni, sauteed spinach, and Parmesan cheese.

So, since we had pasta last night and made last-minute plans to eat out with friend's tomorrow night, I decided to make Shepherd's Pie tonight and I'll make the planned Pasta con Broccoli on Sunday night since, as we all know, I do not cook on Friday or Saturday nights. ;)

While not possessing the same depth of flavors as some recent recipes, this Shepherd's Pie is spectacular. It takes the "meat and potatoes" theme and changes it up just enough to remain a stable comfort food while introducing some new textures and making a fairly easy one-dish meal (easy as long as you can manage three pots on the stove at once)

I briefly considered leaving the carrot layer out of this dish-don't make that mistake. The carrots added a slight sweetness and without them I think the potatoes would have needed a lot more butter, an ingredient I am trying to use minimally and that would change the texture of the potatoes in this case.

Shepherd's Pie

• 4 large potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 1 T butter
• 1 finely chopped onion, divided
  
• 1/2 (or more) grated cheddar cheese, divided
• salt and pepper to taste
• 5 carrots, chopped
• 1 T oil
• 1 lb lean ground beef
• 2 T flour
• 1 T ketchup or Worcestershire sauce (I prefer Worcestershire)
• 3/4 c beef broth

1. preheat oven to 375 degrees
   
2. bring two pots of salted water to a boil
3. to one pot add potatoes and to the other add carrots; let cook 15-20 minutes
4. meanwhile, heat oil in skillet; add onion then beef-drain if desired
5. to beef, stir in flour and cook for 1 minute, then add ketchup/Worcestershire and broth; let simmer 5 minutes
6. when potatoes are ready, mash with butter, 1 T onion, 1/4 c cheese, salt and pepper
7. separately, mash carrots
8. in 9x9 pan, layer beef, then carrots, then potatoes
9. top with remaining cheese
10. bake for 20 minutes