Easy Cottage Pie
I love a good Cottage Pie and all the simple ways you can change this dish around to add new flavors and textures for the little ones. The potato topping satisfies my husbands needs for carbs, and the vegetable and protein make it a great meal for our little ones. As you can see in the photo below, we devoured almost 90% of this pie before I remembered to take a picture when my husband went to take the last piece!
I treat this recipe as something like a frittata, you can just make whatever meat you have on hand, mix whatever vegetables you have, top it with some mashed potatoes and voila - a delicious dinner is on the table! You can even make cheesy mashed potatoes if you want to really spice things up. For this recipe I kept it simple with a red pepper (because that is what we had growing in the garden), a carrot, and some onion. I added some garlic and paprika for seasoning, the topped with mashed potatoes and parsley! This would also be delicious with mushrooms, zucchini, spinach, or any other greens. And you could really make it fun with a sweet potato topping!
Easy Cottage Pie
A delicious ground beef meal, that can be cooked in one pan and enjoyed by everyone! I
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 50 minutes (that includes 25 minutes to boil potatoes)
Total Time: 65 minutes
Servings: 6
Ingredients
1 lb of ground beef (or Force of Nature Ancestry Blend)
2 Carrots
1 Bell Pepper
1/2 onion
3 cloves of garlic
About 5 medium potatoes
4 tbsp butter
Shredded cheddar cheese (option)
Instructions:
Place potatoes in a large pot, and cover completely with water. Boil until easily pierced with a fork, about 25 minutes.
Heat oven to 400 degrees.
Sauté the carrots, bell pepper, and onion in a cast iron skillet for about 5 minutes, or until onion is translucent.
Add garlic, and sauté for another 3 minutes, stirring often,
Toss package of ground beef in the pan and cook until no remaining beef is pink.
Meanwhile, take the potatoes off, add butter, and blend with an emersion blender until creamy and no chunks remain.
Once beef is cooked, top with mashed potatoes and cook for 25 minutes, or the potatoes start to slightly brown in some spots.
Top with cheese during last 5 minutes if desired. Once cooled out of the oven, sprinkle with parsley and serve!
