oh, oh! and you MUST try the lentil shepherd's pie! God's food! :drool:
Veggie Shepherd's Pie
Serves 4 (huge portions though, I reckon you could serve 6 or even 8 if you have it with veggies etc)
Works out about
2 syns plus
1HEXA per portion on Green/EE
Ingredients:
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 3 or 4 cloves garlic, crushed
- 400g carrots, cut into very small cubes
- 2 tbsp fresh thyme, chopped
- 200ml red wine (7 syns)
- 400g tin chopped tomatoes
- 2 stock cubes
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 2 tbsp tomato puree
- Good few shakes Worcestershire sauce
- 200g dried Puy lentils (or you can used drained tinned ones if you work out the relevant weight)
- 500g sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
- 500g baking potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 113g mature cheddar, grated (= 1 HEXA per portion)
Method:
- Simmer lentils in 2-3 times their weight of water for 15 min until half-cooked (skip this if you use tinned ones). Drain.
- In the meantime fry onion and garlic until golden, about 5 min
- Add lentils, carrots, wine, tomatoes, stock cubes, bay leaf, cumin, chilli, tomato puree, Worcestershire sauce and all but a sprinkling of the thyme and simmer for 20 min.
(You might have to add about 100ml of water to feed the lentils depending how fast your hob cooks. But at the end you need the mix to be reduced to a nice thick pie-contents consistency, not runny)
- While that's cooking boil both types of potato for 10-15 min until tender, then drain well, add cinnamon, season well and mash
- When it's all ready put the lentil mix in a casserole dish, spread the mash over followed by the cheese and sprinkle the remaining thyme on top
(If you're not cooking it right away leave it to cool before putting the cheese on)
- When you're ready to cook heat the oven to 190C/170C fan/gas 5 and cook for 20 min straight from the hob, or 40 min from chilled