An Irish-rooted comfort food, Shepherd’s pie, is ground meat enrobed in gravy, covered with vegetables, and topped with whipped or mashed potatoes, then baked in a casserole dish. This Irish-rooted shepherd’s pie is an alternative to Corned Beef and Cabbage and New England boiled dinner on St. Patrick’s Day.
Making Shepherd’s Pie With Leftovers
Shepherd’s pie is an excellent dish for several reasons. At the same time, the dish itself is very warming with gravy, mashed potatoes, meat, and vegetables. The dish itself is reminiscent of the original KFC – a famous bowl that features potato, popcorn chicken, gravy, and corn. It is hard not to like or enjoy.
The making of shepherd’s pie makes it perfect for using up leftovers. The way it is constructed, you can utilize menu items from other meals. You may have extra or cooked extra intentionally to utilize. Either way, you can make shepherd’s pie with leftovers.
Some examples of this would be if you had a cookout and you had cooked extra burgers or chicken. The additional portions of beef or chicken could be ground up or chopped, but they should probably not be mixed. You would use one or the other, then add your gravy, vegetables, and top with mashed potatoes.
Not to be left out would be the original ingredient in shepherd’s pie, lamb. Lamb has a distinctive flavor that not everyone enjoys. However, if you had roasted a lamb and had extra or leftover product, you could cube it into small chunks and do the same process as before with gravy, vegetables, and then potatoes.
Other items that you could utilize or prepare in advance include mashed potatoes and gravy. I would say vegetables, and while this is true, I usually use frozen vegetables for this, so it’s an easy step anyway. However, you can also use leftover vegetables.
Shepherd’s Pie On St. Patrick’s Day?
While I enjoy corned beef and cabbage, I don’t eat it all that often. Once or twice a year, around St. Patrick’s Day, I appreciate it. Not everyone is a big fan of corned beef and cabbage, yet they still enjoy celebrating Irish heritage. This is where shepherd’s pie on St. Patrick’s Day comes in.
Shepherd’s pie, as we have described earlier, is a comfort food. Several restaurants offer shepherd’s pie on their menus throughout the year. However, around St. Patrick’s Day, a massive number of restaurants add this dish to their menus. Shepherd’s Pie on St. Patrick’s Day is not only a great menu item for many but also offers an alternative option to corned beef and cabbage while still celebrating the Irish heritage
I enjoy both of these dishes; if I were to go out twice, I would likely get one of each. I equally enjoy corned beef hash. While corned beef can be explicitly made and cooked for corned beef hash, the hash is often a byproduct of corned beef and cabbage. Corned beef can be easily turned into corned beef hash.
A Simple Shepherd’s Pie Recipe Using Ground Beef
The original shepherd’s pie was made with lamb. The term “shepherd” would imply that this was a dish they would utilize some of their livestock for. As shepherds, they likely would have experienced a sheep being killed by a predator. They would have likely killed the predator or scared it off. They would not have wanted the sheep to go to waste. A simple shepherd’s pie recipe using ground beef wouldn’t have been so simple for them.
This would have been one of the dishes that they came up with. They transformed a bad situation into a classic dish that has endured the test of time. To our benefit, we don’t need to tend sheep as was an everyday livelihood for them in Ireland. I can tell you that in my more than 30 years as a chef, I have never eaten shepherd’s pie made with lamb.
We can make a simple shepherd’s pie recipe using ground beef. A simple summary of the recipe that follows is to cook the ground beef, drain off the fat, incorporate a small amount of flour, and beef bouillon or base (if not using beef stock), and cook slowly in a pan to cook the flour.
Add stock if you aren’t using base, add water if using base. Stir to bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer—season with rosemary, salt, and pepper to taste. Place the ingredients at the bottom of a casserole dish that has been sprayed with pan release. If there is too much gravy, remove some and reserve it for service.
The meat should be covered in gravy but not overboard, and topped with frozen mixed vegetables or corn. This is traditional, however, fresh carrots and Brussels sprouts would also be nice. If using fresh vegetables, they should be cooked at least ¾ of the way before using them. Place a layer of vegetables over the top, cover with mashed potatoes, and bake at 375°F until golden and bubbly.
Shepherds Pie
Ingredients
- 1.5 lbs Ground Beef
- 3 lbs Mashed Potatoes Use 6 medium size potatoes, peel, cube, boil until tender, add 6 Tbl. butter, and 1/2 cup milk or cream. Season, with salt and pepper
- 1 lb. Frozen Corn
- 2 cups Beef Broth
- 2 oz. Roux 2 T. Buttter, 2T. Flour. Combine notes, cook slowly stirring until Nutty aroma
- 2 Tbsp. Tomato Paste Optional
- 1/2 tsp. Rosemary Chopped
- 1 tsp Worcestershire Sauce
- 1 each Onion medium, diced
Instructions
- Cook Ground Beef off in skillet, season with Salt and Pepper
- Drain off fat, remove meat from the pan, saute onion, mix with the beef
- In a saucepan add stock, tomato, Worcestershire sauce, whisk in prepared cooked roux as listed
- Simmer the sauce or gravy, adjust the thickness of the sauce, add more stock or water if too thick. The sauce should coat the back of a spoon when immersed and extracted from the sauce.
- Spray a 2-quart casserole dish with pan spray, on the bottom of the pan, spread the beef-onion mixture evenly, cover the meat with sauce,
- Place a layer of frozen corn over the top of the beef/gravy evenly you (could use frozen mixed vegetables as well)
- Take your mashed potatoes and spread them evenly over the layer of corn, this will be a thicker layer. Drizzle melted butter, or brush melted butter or olive oil over the top of the potatoes.
- Bake at 375 until the entire casserole is bubbly hot, or potatoes get slightly browned. Serve.
