Shepherd’s (but technically Cottage) Pie: Serves 2 (loads)

Sometimes one just wants some honest hearty English fare. Failing that, one could do worse than Shepherd’s Pie. Although, it must be said I make it with beef, which I gather means its Cottage Pie. I understand that shepherds – sheep-herds- tend flocks of sheep, so I am a little stumped as to the use of the term ‘cottage’ for the collective pronoun for cattle – but there you go – this recipe has been handed for generations by my family of cottagers ? No. That really does not work – let us call it ‘Shepherd’s Pie with beef not lamb’.

I love bolognaise. I love Italian food in general, but, like so many home kitchen schooled boys, bolognaise was the first and only dish I learned to cook whilst living at home. Nowadays it’s a little different, and I like to try to keep a clear distinction between my sheph... cottage... pie and anything that bears an even passing resemblance to Italian cuisine. The same is true for chilli-con-carne. These three dishes are so similar that I am at pains to keep them distinct I think of them as different points of an equilateral triangle and the area they define encompasses the scope of what they could be. For this reason I do not put red wine in this dish, nor do I put garlic or bay leaf or oregano (but like bolognaise, they both have beef, onion celery and carrot. I think it’s important to try to maintain a these distinctions so one can develop an identity for each dish and can explore the uniqueness rather than its common ground. Anyway, I can cook a killer bolognaise in my sleep, and to be honest I am still working on the cottage pie – here is the current version (and it’s still damned tasty – even though sarah reminded me I totally cocked it up last time – make sure you let the veg sweat down properly and the alcohol cook off – jeez that was bad)

INGREDIENTS:
500gms minced beef (It’s better to have less meat of higher quality – you really can taste it)
1 lrg  to 3 sml onions.
1 lrg carrot
1 stick of celery
1 bottle of stout
1 large baking potato
dollop crème freich / splash of double cream / splash of milk
50gms mature cheddar
Seasoning
half tin of tomatoes
err... I think thats it – read through the recipe for surprise additional ingredients.

THE MEAT

First off mix some black pepper (and possibly some finely chopped parsley) into the minced beef. Form this into small patties and fry in reasonably hot pan that is just skimmed with a little fat (I would use butter or left-over fat drained from a different dish – in this case it was leftover fat from the roasted Pork belly we made two nights ago). We form the meat into patties to create a level of texture within the dish – there is a bit of bite to the meat and a gradation in colouring between the edge of the patty meat and the meat inside the patty. The meat is cooked at a reasonably high temperature to ensure that the edges of the patty ‘brown’. This is ‘grey’ but actually a slightly crispy real ‘brown’ colour. Doing this allows various sugars in the meat to caramelise and that will give it a sweet rich and distinctly ‘brown’ note. The meat inside the patty is effectively steamed and will yield a different flavour – the two combined basically double your money!

The other thing to avoid – a crime which we have observed on numerous occasions – is the ‘stir-fry temptation’. When cooking meat, and particularly mince avoid stirring it! The more it is moved the more it releases its water creating steam and not only drying the meat out, but effectively steaming it rather than frying it – this will make the meat go grey, it will cook away considerable flavour and will not benefit from proper browning. When cooked (do not cram the pan – if necessary do it in two batches) lift out and set to one side. I suggest placing the patties in the bottom of whatever dish is being used for the final construction – this means you can still keep any residual juices that drain from the patties – it is all good flavour. 
There should now be some fat in the pan that has rendered out of the beef patties.

THE SAUCE

Whilst the patties are cooking, finely chop the three standard veg’s: onion, carrot & celery. When the patties are cooked, fry these veg in the residual fat in the pan. Add more butter if necessary. As this cooks i will chuck in some fresh thyme. This needs to be cooked on a fairly low heat – we want the veg to slowly caramelise – unlike the meat, I turn this quite frequently releasing a bit of steam. As the veg dries slightly and begin to go translucent I might add a splash here and there of stout. If you put too much in reduces the overall temperature and the pan will have to heat up considerably. Eventually the whole bottle goes in, and a half tin of tomatoes we had left over from some dish cooked earlier this week. The tomatoes go really well with beef, but I do not want too much of their flavour – I do not want this dish to resemble a bolognaise sauce. I will probably add the patties pack to the pan around now
Once the alcohol has had time to cook off and the entire thing has married slightly we can put it in the final dish. In today’s case, because we took the fish pie around to my others, we have not got the shepherd’s pie dish and so I have to make do with two small and fairly shallow dishes – I am writing this as I cook so I do not know quite how the final bit will manifest – but it will be lovely I am sure – although I will honestly report if it is not!

THE MASH

Mashed potato is a filling vessel for cream, cheese and butter. Why not include some herbs and mustard for a bit of diversity?
I have chopped my large making spud into small chunks. I am going to steam the spud skin and all. I actually like the nutty flavour that the potato skin gives after mashing, and apparently its where whatever vitamins are presents in potatoes, like to hide. Cutting into smaller pieces increases the surface area and should mean shorter cooking (it’s about heat transference and entropy – a fascinating subject but not directly suited to this blog – basically the insides will get hot faster the smaller the pieces are, and the less cooking time the less the goodness of the sups will have been cooked away.)
At this junction I am sorely tempted to combine this with celeriac mash for a double whammy. It’s so delightfully savoury. But, I am also using celery in the sauce and there is no need to double up on the flavour. 

I take the spuds out and leave them to stand for a moment on a chopping board allowing clouds of steam to be released – helping this dehydration means the potato will suck up all of the milk, crème frieche and butter I am about to put. Return to their now emptied steaming pan and mash the shit out of them. Keep adding small slugs of milk and butter etc if it is drying out, but only in small doses. Now chuck in a healthy dose of white pepper and for this dish a good tsp of English mustard. It must be English mustard – there is extra fire in English mustard and the yellow colour will help make the spuds seem golden. If you want to – and frequently I do – add a small amount of grated mature cheddar. (if you want to go continental because you don’t have any English mustard, use Dijon and add some Roquefort...). I also mixed in some finely chopped fresh parsley – you know, it counts as healthy ‘greens’ doesn’t it?

RE-COMPOSITION:
When the lower portion of the dish – meat and sauce – has cooled slightly dollop the mash onto the meat and sauce