Cottage Pie recipe

Home-made cottage pie is one of those comforting nursery foods that are warming and sustaining on cold winter days. Fluffy mashed potato with the top crisp and golden, over savoury beef or lamb mince, tender from slow cooking. Children love it and the chopped up vegetables mixed in with the meat will often get past the most determined of fussy eaters.

Traditionally this is called cottage pie when made with beef mince and shepherds pie with lamb mince; the recipe for both is the same, maybe just adding a touch of rosemary with the lamb version. The dish evolved as a way of using up the leftovers from the Sunday roast. Cooked meat was minced and cooked up again as a potato-topped pie. Nowadays we rarely serve large enough roasts to produce all those leftovers, so cottage pie is more often made with bought raw mince.

Recipe for Cottage Pie

Ingredients
500g / 1lb beef mince
1 medium onion
2 carrots
1 stick celery
2 courgettes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 bay leaf
sprig thyme
80ml / 1/3 cup milk
a dash of wine
½ tin of chopped tomatoes
½ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 kg / 2lbs potatoes
butter and milk for mashing
salt and pepper

Chop the onion, carrot, celery and courgettes quite finely. Sauté them all in the vegetable oil in a heavy based pan over a medium low heat until softened.

Raise the heat and add the beef mince stirring it all until it has just lost the raw red colour. It shouldn’t be too well browned as this will toughen the meat. Add the milk and stir in, letting it bubble gently till most of the liquid is gone. This extra step makes the meat more tender.

Add the wine and cook for another minute or so till the alcohol has evaporated. Now add the tomatoes and herbs. Season with the Worcestershire sauce and salt and pepper. Add ½ -1 cup water or stock just enough to keep the meat moist. Cover the pan and simmer gently for at least half an hour, preferably one hour or more.

Peel the potatoes and boil in salted water until tender. Drain them well, allowing the steam to rise off and dry them. Add a generous knob of butter and half a cup of milk. Mash with a potato masher. Add more milk as needed until you get a soft fluffy mash. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Preheat the oven to 200C / 400F. Transfer the meat into a roasting tin or baking dish with a slotted spoon to leave most of the excess liquid behind. Top with a thick layer of mashed potato and even it out with a fork. Make patterns as you like with the fork, which will help get those delicious crispy bits on the top. Bake for 20-30 minutes until the top is golden and the meat sizzling. Rest for 5 minutes before serving.

Hungry for good home-style food now? Why not eat out at The Peacock restaurant in Derby and enjoy their take on the British classics.