Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie

Sounds sort of like an oxymoron right? But it wasn't! It was delicious and actually enjoyed by every single member of my family. YAAAAY! That means I will get to put it in our repeat file. I found the recipe here http://www.robinrobertson.com/Vegan_Recipes.htm (scroll down half way). Robin Robertson wrote a really great cookbook with vegetarian recipes for a slow cooker so I was excited to see a bunch of recipes from her other books on her website.

I started the shepherd's pie the night before we were planning to eat it because the next day was a busy one for us - we are gone all day and don't get home until around 4 so I always try and plan ahead for Tuesday's dinner. I peeled 5 pounds of yukon gold potatoes and steamed them quickly in my pressure cooker.




This is a page from a great book called Vegetarian Cooking Under Pressure by Nava Atlas. It has some wonderful recipes in it, but also many reference pages like this. There's a chart for the cooking times in a pressure cooker for all different types of vegetables, grains and beans. Really helpful!



When they were done (in 5 minutes! Gotta love the pressure cooker) and the pressure had died down, I took some potatoes out to save to make a couple breakfasts for my husband. He loves to eat heavy breakfasts and then a late lunch and no dinner, but I don't often have time to really cook at breakfast time. So whenever I cook potatoes I always try to make extra so it's a snap to fry them up in the morning for him. It's a simple way to earn some extra "good wife" points. :-P


The rest of them are going to get mashed for the top of the shepherd's pie. I didn't want to use butter or milk because I would have to use some of my coveted weekly points (I am doing Weight Watcher's Core plan) for it and I'd rather spend the points on cheese, bread and chocolate (in that order). So I was trying to make Core mashed potatoes. Definitely not as yummy as putting in tons of butter and milk or cream, but they actually turned out pretty good.

I poured out the water that was used to steam the potatoes and put in some concentrated vegetable broth and some salt and pepper and herbamare and then used that water while I was mashing the potatoes. I kept tasting as I went along and added more of whatever it needed as I mashed.

I also used some olive oil for flavor and for a bit of fat in it - it's no sub for butter, but it worked. Here's the finished mashed potatoes and I just put the lid on the pressure cooker and put it in the garage fridge until the next day.


Then I needed to chop the veggies. Carrots, onion and zucchini.

Put all of them in a container and then in the fridge overnight. The carrots are under the onions because they had to be sauteed together first.


So the next day, the kids and I staggered home after a long day of not-at-home schooling and dinner was pretty easy to put together. Saute the onions and carrots in a bit of olive oil.

While they are cooking, I put together the "gravy" ingredients.



Then I added the zucchini, some frozen peas and the chopped up veggie burgers to the pan.


Once the burgers were thawed, and the veggies were mostly cooked, I poured in the gravy mixture and let it thicken up a bit. I poured all of it into a baking dish and then spread the mashed potatoes over the top. I then sprayed the top with olive oil (love my Misto sprayer!) and sprinkled with paprika.




I put it into the oven to bake and then ran out to the library to return some books and pick up the ones that were on hold for me. When I came back, the house smelled really yummy and we were ready to eat. Here's what it looked like fresh from the oven.



As I said above, everybody liked it and had at least seconds. At the end, my two older kids were trading - one wanted the mashed potatoes and the other wanted the vegetables so they slid their plates across the table and kept eating. What a success! Now you try it. :-)