Cottage
A shepherd's pie involves lamb mince but a cottage pie contains beef mince. Fresh from the oven and pictured above, that's a cottage pie I made over two weeks ago before Phoebe and Margot flew to Australia with their parents. It was carefully constructed. There was grated Cheddar cheese on the top surface and below that, something a little different from mere mashed potato. It was a 50/50 mixture of mashed potato and mashed swede ( American: rutabaga ). The meat layer beneath required 500 grams of good quality beef mince, a chopped onion and a large diced carrot. There was also half a tin of kidney beans, three cloves of chopped garlic, salt and pepper, a teaspoonful of dry mixed herbs, an "Oxo" cube, a dollop of tomato puree and half a tin of chopped tomatoes. These ingredients bubbled together on a low heat for ninety minutes before I was ready to spoon the mince mixture into our largest casserole dish. When the mash and the cheese had been layered on top...