I suppose everyone has their own version of this classic, so I guess I better post mine!
It’s one of the classic comfort foods, really makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside hahaha. Traditionally more of a winter dish I guess, but I suppose it is winter somewhere in the world right now!
Here goes!
You will need:
- about 500gm lean beef mince
- one large onion
- 3 medium carrots
- 2 sticks of celery
- beef stock
- 2 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
- 1 can peeled and diced tomatoes (yes you can use fresh tomatoes but I am lazy!)
- 1 can whole kernel corn
- 3 cloves of garlic
- +- 8 medium potatoes
- some milk or cream
- some baking powder
- some parmesan (optional)
- A piping bag (optional)
First off make some mashed potatoes (click here if you don’t know how). I went the fancy route and put the mash in a piping bag so I can make pretty patterns with it, but you can obviously just spoon it over and draw some lines in with a fork.
For the filling, roughly chop up the carrots, celery and onions.
Heat up some olive oil in a medium sized pot and fry this mix until the onion goes translucent. Remove it from the pot for now.
Add the steak mince to the pot and fry until brown, then you can add back the onion, carrot and celery mix.
Next I add some beef stock, I tried out Ina Paarman’s Beef Stock and I think its pretty good! Give it a try and let me know what you think .
Next I add a dash of worcestershire sauce, this always helps to bring out the flavour of meat, particularly beef
Then pop in the corn
The tomatoes
and some freshly chopped garlic
Mix that through thoroughly and turn down the heat. Leave it for at least an hour to simmer, stirring occasionally. The longer you can let this simmer the better it will get.
Preheat your oven to about 180 degrees Celsius. Get out the pie containing thingy of your choice and scoop in some of the filling. Top it with the mashed potatoe we made earlier.
The piping bag thing will probably work better if your mash mix is not as dry as mine, I really struggled squeezing it out, so I’ll blame my crappy pattern thingies on that!
Once you are done making a mess, top it with some finely grater parmesan / pecorino. This will add some flavour to the “crust” and make it brown nicely.
Pop that into the oven for about 10 minutes on 180, then switch the oven to Grill mode and grill these puppies until golden brown. I think I took mine out a little too early, I was starving ok!
There you have it, enjoy!
