Potato Free Shepherd's Pie Recipe

In brief, having suffered from awful recurrent ulcers in my 20s, I read a book about how food and chemical allergies and intolerances work and discovered the cause of all the acute and dreadful pain was simply potatoes. I wrote about this elesewhere and I will give you a link so you can read more if interested.  

Since putting up that page, I have discovered that there are a lot of potato allergy sufferers out there. Symptoms can very from mild indigestion to anaphylactic reactions. Medical professionals' attitudes vary from sympathetic reassurances to indignant disbelief. People are looking for potato substitutes as I speak and I have discovered a few over the years. 

I get a little fed up with foodies, nurses and food manufacturers who persist in the belief that potatoes are safe. As far as I am concerned, so are nuts, strawberries, shellfish, gluten, milk.... Need I go on? If you have a potato allergy, I am going to share a few alternative recipes over time and if not, you might just enjoy trying these out anyway.

The sweet potato or yam is no relation at all to the regular potato, but it is a little miracle in its own right. It contains vitamins B6, vtamin C, vitamin D, iron, potassium, magnesium, is high in carotenoids and the complex sugars they contain are slow release to avoid problems with blood sugar swings. Now that in my book is a LOT more respectable than the common potato. These nutrients have been found to help in all manner of disease prevention, including the big three - heart disease, cancer and diabetes. I will give you a link to a great article later.

For now, believe me when I tell you sweet potatoes are good for you, but they are sweet right? So how can you use them in a savoury dish? They work because of the way I cook with herbs as seasoning. My shepherd's pie recipe is not particularly sweet but it is tasty!

Peel and chop up two medium sized sweet potatoes. Place in a pan with enough water to cover, add about a teapoon of salt and a little fresh ground pepper, bring to the boil and cover and simmer until soft. When soft, drain off all the liquid, add a knob of butter and mash. You can be doing all the preparation of the mince while the potatoes are cooking of course!

I live with a strict vegetarian, so this is a vegetarian recipe. You could use minced meat if you prefer, but unless it is very lean you will need to reverse the steps here:

1. Peel and dice 1 small carrot, 1 red onion, 1 stick of celery
2. Put into a pan with a little oil or butter, a little salt and some cumin seeds.
3. Saute until the onion and celery are transparent
4. Add water and bring to the boil.
5. Add a pinch of oregano and a little fresh rosemary simmer for a few minutes
6. Add your dried soya mince and cook for a few minutes, then leave to stand and absorb liquid
7. Put the mixture into the baking dish, adding a little more water if it seems too dry.

If using Quorn mince, add much less water

If using meat mince, add meat first, then drain off excess fat, use much less water

When you add the sweet potato mash, add it in half spoonfuls over the whole dish to ensure an even spread. Don't rush this, or you will end up with an uneven and messy shepherd's pie. Once the top is covered in half spoonfuls of mash, spread lightly with a fork to get nice ridges.

Put the pie in a medium oven for about 35 minutes. Grate some cheese while it is cooking, and chop some white winter cabbage. Never mind that nouvelle stuff, we are going to be terribly British here!

Purists might not want to add the grated cheese, but the pie does benefit from it, if does offset the slight sweetness of the sweet potatoes and produce something incredibubbly yummy! I added the cheese and gave the pie a further 15 minutes while I meanwhile cooked up the cabbage with a little water and a knob of goat's butter and heated some obviously disgusting tinned mushy peas. (I did say this is too, too terribly, British!)

This recipe SHOULD have served 4, but we got carried away and ate it all! No problem, it was a low fat and low carb meal! 

I owe special thanks here to a very dear friend of mine, Annie, who introduced me to an extremely  nice version of shepherd's pie using mashed cauliflower for anyone with carbohydrate intolerance. Again, this works very well indeed and is particularly tasty with lamb mince. Thank you Annie - I hope you will try and enjoy this recipe too.

Yes, my plating skills are a little rough at the edges, but I got really hungry making this. The two of us finished it in one sitting, so I can tell you it is delicious. Final word must go to Colin:

Me -     How do you think Potato Free Shepherd's Pie tastes?

Colin -  Ordinary shepherd's pie is a bit drier flavour than this. I thought it was smashing! It is much like shepherd's pie, but a bit creamier and sweeter. The sweet potatoes are nice and it is a dish in its own right.

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