Lentil Shepherds Pie

In my bid to eat more lentils & wanting an excuse to crack open a bottle of red on a Monday night I decided to make lentil shepherds pie. I had all sorts of disasters with the pastry & thought that it wasn't going to work out so decided to make little pies in a muffin pan because I thought they would stay together better & be easier to serve than one big pie.

The pastry I used was this one from cooks.com (subbing soy milk for skim milk). It turned out ok, but I ended up adding an extra 5 tablespoons of soy milk because there was no way it was going to come together & there was lots of crumbs that would just not come together that I threw out.

The actual pie recipe I made up as I was going, but it was pretty similar to the lentil red wine hot pot recipe which I really liked!

1 zucchini diced
2 small carrots diced
1 onion diced
2 cloves garlic
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 can diced tomatoes
1/3 cup red wine
1 can brown lentils
1 tsp massel beef stock powder
2 tsp orgran gravy powder
1/4 tsp sage
1/4 tsp celery salt
olive oil

Cook zucchini, carrot, onion & garlic in a little bit of olive oil until soft.
Add in tomato paste, stir over medium heat for a couple of minutes
Add tomatoes, red wine, stock powder, gravy powder, sage & celery salt for about 15 minutes until thickened
Add lentils to heat through

So once that was all ready I put it into the prepared pastry in the muffin pan & topped with mashed potato which I got ready while my pie filling was cooking. I used dutch cream potatoes for my topping because I think they are the goods. I think I particularly like them because I read somewhere that they are "high class potatoes"! I piped my potato on to fancy them up a bit & I think it is actually easier than trying to spread mash on top. The pies were then baked for 20 minutes at 180 degrees or until they are browned on top. I served them with garlicky mushrooms & brussel sprouts.


My kitty Roxy like to check out what is happening & get involved when I am cooking!