Healthy Shephard's Pie

Why am I posting a recipe on a family blog? A few reasons. The first one is, I get a LOT of requests for this recipe. This is my go-to recipe for a potluck, or a meal when someone is sick or just had a baby, and I also make it about twice a month, so I frequently end up serving it to guests or playdate friends. I think almost every time I make it, someone asks me for the recipe, which I take to mean it tastes pretty good. I'm also posting it because as far as I know, I made it up, and it tickles me that the most popular recipe in this house (by vote of our kids) is one that I make - although it should be fairly noted that daddy the professional chef kicks my butt at everything else, from pancakes to frittata. And the third one is, I have found a rare recipe that is both FULL of vegetables and truly kid friendly - there are some kids who are so picky that they won't eat this, but I've served it to many a child on a playdate and it goes over well most of the time. If you, like me, are always searching for vegetable-full recipes your children will eat, try this one. As an added bonus it's gluten, soy, egg and dairy free and can be made vegetarian, which is quite adaptable in this age of many food allergies and intolerances. Finally, a friend of mine with lots more blog readers than I have said I should post something on the blog people might conceivably be googling to find, which will direct them to my blog and introduce the possibility they will keep reading it. (to that end: healthy dinners, healthy kid dinners. dinners with lots of vegetables. etc. find me, google!) So here you go, this is my own version of shephard's pie. Make it, enjoy it, and snicker at your kids eating cauliflower with gusto.

Ingredients: (this recipe makes enough to feed my family of 4 hearty shephard's pie eaters for 2 nights)

5 lg yukon gold potatoes
1 head cauliflower
1 medium onion
1 yellow bell pepper
2-3 grated carrots or about 1 c. chopped baby carrots
frozen peas
1.5 tbs olive oil
1 lb ground beef, turkey, or 1 large can each (the double size ones) kidney beans and chickpeas (if you want to make it vegetarian)
olive oil, chicken stock, margarine, coconut milk or whatever you usually like to mash potatoes with (if dairy is fine for you, use milk and butter)
ketchup
soy sauce
worstershire sauce
spicy brown mustard

Directions:

In a large pot of salted water, place the potatoes and cauliflower, all chopped up into small pieces. Put the heat on high and bring up to a boil.

after you do that, dice the onion, bell pepper and carrots and saute in the olive oil about 5-7 minutes.

Then add your meat (or beans). Cook through.

when the meat is cooked, turn off the heat, leaving the pan on the stove. add approximately 2/3 c ketchup, 1/3 cup mustard, and a generous amount each of worstershire and soy sauces to the vegetable and meat mixture. unfortunately I forgot to measure how much I usually use. Anyway, just taste it and see it tastes good. those four things mixed together are hard to get wrong, really.

Then put it all into the bottom of your biggest pyrex because this recipe makes a lot. sprinkle a half bag of peas over it.

Finally, drain and mash your potatoes/cauliflower. I usually use either chicken stock, olive oil and salt OR unsweetened coconut milk (the beverage, not the stuff in a can) and smart balance, but you can use whatever you like. don't forget some salt. it just depends what I have on hand. Mashed anything tastes pretty good no matter how you do it.

Finally, spread the mashed on top of the meat and peas, put in the oven for 30 minutes or so at about 350, and voila. dinner for two nights. plus lunch for the kids sometimes too. I don't know precisely how many servings of vegetables are in each serving, but I'm willing to guess at least 5. onions, carrots, bell pepper, peas, cauliflower and potato in every bite, so you can choose not to count the onion or the potato as vegetables and still end up with 5 veggies per serving. And it truly is kid friendly - I think it's the ketchup.

Finished product from the side:

Clean plate club:

Enjoy!