Healthy Shepherd's Pie
Today I took the
mock mashed "potatoes" (mashed cauliflower) from May 9th and used them to top a shepherd's pie. Shepherd's pie is a meat and vegetable mixture, topped with mashed potatoes and cheese. You can use almost any vegetables and almost any ground meat, traditional meat is ground lamb, but you can use ground beef or ground turkey instead. Today I used carrots, beans and ground turkey. My old recipe used onion soup mix, but it had added sugars and gluten - not to mention MSG, so instead, I used 1 T beef bullion (gluten and sugar free) and 2 T dried onion plus 1 t xanthan gum and it has the same effect. You could leave out the xanthan gum if you don't have it, it just "sticks" the meat and veggies together and has no "net" carbohydrates since it's almost 100% fiber.
1 lb ground meat
2 cups mixed vegetables
1 T beef bullion
2 T dried onion
1 t xanthan gum (optional)
1/2 head of cauliflower
1/2 t garlic, diced
3 oz cream cheese (optional)
1/2 t chicken bullion
1/2 C to 1 C cheddar cheese
Brown the ground meat in a skillet or stove top safe casserole dish. If you are using a lean meat, add a little butter or olive oil to the skillet first. While the meat is browning, add the vegetables (unless yours were precooked, in which case, add them after the meat it cooked through). Once the meat is completely browned and the veggies are tender, add the beef bullion, dried onion and sprinkle on the guar gum and stir it in.
Meanwhile, cook the cauliflower (I just microwave it with a bit of water, covered). Make sure it's really mushy. Drain it well and process in a food processor, adding the chicken bullion and cream cheese and process until smooth. Since my two daughters can't have dairy, but everyone else likes it, I removed half the cauliflower before adding the cream cheese such that half the casserole was dairy free.
Put the meat/veggie mixture in a casserole dish (if it wasn't already) and top with the cauliflower mixture. Top that with cheddar cheese. I used half a cup because I was only covering one side, if you are covering the whole top, you may want to use a whole cup of cheese. As you can see, I only topped the non-dairy free side (side that also had cream cheese mixed into the cauliflower) with the cheddar cheese.
Bake at 350 for about half an hour or until the cheese bubbles and starts to brown.
Here it is just out of the oven.
Makes around 6 servings: 234 calories, 5.2 grams carbohydrates, 1.7 grams fiber. Without the cream cheese or cheddar: 168 calories, same carb and fiber content.
Peel any vegetables that need to be and cut everything into bite sized pieces. Put them all in a bag and add 2 t olive oil, 2 t salt, 1 t garlic powder or minced garlic. Shake up in the bag to make sure all veggies get coated. Pour out onto a baking sheet (can use 9x13" baking pan if you don't have a larger, flatter pan). Roast at 425 degrees for 15 minutes, stir and roast another 5-10 minutes or until vegetables start to brown on the edges and longer cooking vegetables (like carrots) are tender.
