Weeknight Cooking

Shepherd's Pie seems to be just a little bit different at every bar or restaurant you try it, especially

when it comes to how the meat inside is prepared.  Many American versions simply use ground and seasoned hamburger so that when the spoon sinks in it finds thick piles of meat.  The recipe I tried actually called for a 2 lb. lamb shoulder but I had in mind, for whatever reason, a soupier version – more like mashed potatoes and chunky vegetable gravy – so chose a pound and a half's worth of pre-

cooked pot roast chunks. These came in fairly small packages, drizzled with a layer of au jus sauce, which eventually worked very well as a potent supplement to the called-for 3 cups of beef stock.  The recipe idea is to put together a well-simmered meat selection, vegetables and a sauce to form a liquid paste that is then covered by rich mashed potatoes.

You go about this by simmering the roast and au jus in one pan while softening carrots, onions, celery, peas, garlic in another, all the while boiling the potatoes.  Add 1/3 cup of flour to the veggies as a thickening agent, some touches of rosemary, three full cups of beef stock (in this case adding the pre-

cooked au jus waiting warm in the other pan) and, what I came to think the most secret ingredient, 2/3 cup of a good white wine.  As a large simmering pan of vegetable and beef eventually cooks together, it is the sweetness of the wine that adds a layer of depth to an otherwise beefy concoction.  At this point, because the meat selection was purposefully thin, the stew needed considerable reducing in order to get the point of a pre-paste, remembering that the pie will thicken by baking for 20 minutes, then setting for 5 minutes.  For the potatoes, after boiling, some butter and nearly a cup of heavy cream, to mash to the point that is firm enough to shape and hold over the pie mixture.  Bake until golden brown, let sit and what comes out is a fast-track version of shepherd's pie that exceeds most other mass produced versions in eateries.  One of the reasons the homemade version ends up better, is that all the while you are cooking, you can tamper with textures, consistencies and richness depending on taste and audience.  The sweet yet beefy sauce hits a variety of comforting notes underneath a deep crust of creamed potatoes.