I bought suppengemuse (a bunch of root vegetables consisting of a couple of large carrots, a leek, a piece of celeriac and some parsley), this is put together to form the base of a good stock. I always buy a one at the market and if doing a roast will roughly chop it and layer the base of the roasting dish.
So right lets get down to the cottage pie (the same as a shepherds pie but uses cottagers instead of Shepherds Lol, lol, lol) sorry couldn't resist.
I used Ceps in this just because they are plentiful & cheap(relatively) at the moment and are the best tasting one , but any brown cultivated mushrooms will do.
Ingredients:
1 medium leek (about 1/4 the size of a Geordie prize leek)
1/4 of a celeriac globe
2 large carrots
2 medium or 1 large onion
100g of Ceps (or any wild or cultivated mushrooms)
3 shallots
2 cloves of garlic
100g of diced smoked ham (schinken speck, this does give it a nice depth of flavour)
1/2l of good vegetable stock (either make your own or I used Marigold)
500g of lean beef mince
2 teaspoons of tomato puree
1 desert spoon of chopped fresh herbs (I used thyme and rosemary)
olive oil for frying (you can use any oil you like, BUT I like olive oil)
Salt and pepper
1kg of floury potatoes (mehlig in Germany)
50g of butter
1 large egg
First cut the mushrooms, carrot, leek and celeriac into small dice.(called brunoise in cheffy circles), sweat these in a saucepan, add the tomato puree and cook out, set to one side then dice the the onions, shallots.
Put the smoked ham into the pan with a bit of oil, fry a little, now add onions, shallots and garlic and soften these until translucent (no colour), add the beef mince (or lamb mince in the case of shepherds pie), brown until it starts to give up its fats, keep stiring and add the vegetables to the mince (it was at this stage that I thought " if I ever needed to do a vegetarian dish, this would be a doddle to change, just miss out the smoked ham and add a load more mushrooms instead of the mince".
Add the stock, put the lid on, turn the heat down to a simmer and forget about.
Next put the spuds on to boil when soft and breaking, pour off the water and leave to steam dry in a collander or sieve over the warm pan. Now return to the pan and mash like billy'o add the butter and the egg and mash it all together, I have heard of some people doing this in a food processor, well you can if you like the taste of wall paper. I always use either a potatoe ricer or a good old hand masher.
When the mince and veg mixture (or just veggie mixture) is cooked, ladel it out with a slotted spoon and into an oven proof dish (saving the stock to make extra gravy), 2/3rds fill the dish, now spoon the spuds on top starting at the outer rim working around and then filling in the middle.
(this stops the mixture from running down the sides of the bowl and then dripping onto your trousers). Run a forks prongs across the surface to make bonnie patterns (this browns and looks nice). set aside, or refridgerate while you go and do something else useful (fill up the car, watch the footy or listen to TMS).
Reference the potato topping:
I often make a swede (turnip for us from up Narth) and potato mash and mix in a handful of strong cheese, sprinkling a bit of grated parmisan on the top.(this browns up nicely)
If you really want to make it cheffy , then filet some tomatoes (skinned, deseeded and cut into 1/8ths) and stratigically place them on top of the mash.
I served this with young carrots, string beans and roast Hokkaido pumpkin.
Pumpin segments put into a roasting dish, sprinkled with garam-masala, nutmeg and mace, a couple of turns of salt and pepper from the mill, sprinkled with olive oil and roasted in a medium oven until soft.
I know the English will be thinking "well why the hell is he telling his Grandmother how to suck eggs"!!! But this is a dish unknown in Germany, so they now know what a "cottage pie" is and how to make it.
Cheers
No comments:
Post a Comment