Easy Shepherd's Pie

As an Irish girl I can't help but love Shepherd's Pie! Its great you just throwing in what veggies you have on hand with mashed potatoes and lamb. Its just a great dinner to share with the family as the weather starts to cool. Now in the current economy you might not be able to buy lamb because it is more expensive than beef, but thats fine because beef tastes great in place of lamb. I will tell you though this is not really a "Shepherd's Pie" its called a cottage pie. But most Americans don't know the difference so we will just call it Shepherd's Pie.

Easy Shepherd's Pie Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 lbs ground round beef (I use 1/2 lbs of beef in an 8x8 baking dish, for 4 people. If you use all the beef use a 9x13 baking dish)
• 1 onion chopped
• 1-2 cups vegetables - chopped carrots, corn, peas
  
• 1 1/2 - 2 lbs potatoes (3 big ones)
• 8 tablespoons butter (1 stick)
  
• 1/2 cup beef broth
  
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• Salt, pepper, other seasonings of choice

Method

1 Peel and quarter potatoes, boil in salted water until tender (about 20 minutes).

2 While the potatoes are cooking, melt 4 Tablespoons butter (1/2 a stick) in large frying pan.

3 Sauté onions in butter until tender over medium heat (10 mins) (I can't eat dairy products due to my food allergy so I use olive oil or vegan margarines.). If you are adding vegetables, add them according to cooking time. Put any carrots in with the onions. Add corn or peas either at the end of the cooking of the onions, or after the meat has initially cooked ( I over load on the veggies because I cut back on the beef. you can use other veggies if you like. I used the holly food trinity onions, carrots, and celery. And at the very end I add frozen peas because they cook very fast.).

4 Add ground beef and sauté until no longer pink (I personally use less beef because I'm only cooking for three, and if you uses an 8x8 baking dish you can get away with 1/2 lbs of beef). Add salt and pepper. Add worcesterchire sauce (I didn't have this when I first made this recipe so I subbed 1 teaspoon of soy sauce and two dashes of hot sauce, and I think it tasted better thanWorcestershire sauce) . Add half a cup of beef broth and cook, uncovered, over low heat for 10 minutes, adding more beef broth as necessary to keep moist (Freeze the other half of the broth can or rest of the broth you don't use.).

5 Mash potatoes in bowl with remainder of butter, season to taste. Spread mashed potatoes over the meat mix in the baking dish. Then place the baking dish under the broiler until the potatoes get golden on top.