Lentil Shepherd's Pie

Lentil Shepherd's Pie

Fall is here and it's time for stews and casseroles and warming yummy food.  I made us a huge lentil shepherd's pie the other day and it fed us for days. 

Lentil Shepherd's Pie Recipe

2 - 3 cups of lentils (or  2 or 3 cans of pre-cooked)

5 - 6 baker potatoes or a whole bunch of little red or yellow pots 

(with skin, that's where the fiber is, folks!)

onion

carrots

garlic

kale or greens of some type

Big can of roasted chopped toms or a couple cups of fresh chopped toms

tomato paste

green peas (fresh or frozen)

cooking oil

soy or almond milk

Italian Herb or Herbs de Provence

Salt and Pepper

This recipe is not an exact science.  I make this casserole a bit differently each time.  Sometimes I add more vegetables like broccoli or fresh parsley.  You can be very creative.  The great thing about a casserole like this is it can be stuffed full of vegetables and we all know that vegetables are where it's at!  Full of micro and phytonutrients.... it's the perfect place to be generous.

1.  Wash the lentils thoroughly.  Trust me, you really gotta do this.  We crunched some rocks in this last casserole and that just sucks.  I like to use black lentils or french lentils because they are "meatier" in texture for the casserole.

2.  Put lentils in a big pot of water and bring to a boil.  Cook until just tender - maybe 20 - 30 minutes.  Watch and taste.  If they get mushy then the casserole is less pleasing to your mouth.  Once cooked, drain and set aside.

3.  While the lentils are cooking, chop an onion, some garlic, and some carrots.  Put them in a saute pan with oil and cook until just tender (again, don't overcook!).  Add in a couple heaping tablespoons of Italian herb or my favorite, Herbs de Provence which has lavender in it!  The H de P is the ticket, if you ask me. 

4.  As those are cooking, chop up a big bunch of kale, chard or collards and throw into the pan with onion mix.  Cook for a bit until it's all looking good and then add tomatoes, about 2 - 4 tablespoons of tomato paste, and 2 or more cups green peas.  Cook a bit longer.  Remember  ---- this will all get another 30 - 45 minutes of baking time so you don't want to make it mushy.

5.  Add lentils to the vegetable saute mix.  Add some salt and pepper and taste.  Does it need more H de P or tomato paste?  Be creative and add what you like at this point.

6.  While the vegetables were in saute mode, I hope you were washing, chopping and boiling your potatoes for the mashed potato bit.  Come on, you can do it ---- three pots on the stove.

             1 pot for lentils

             1 huge saute pan for the vegetable mixture

             1 large pot for potatoes to boil

All we need is love!

7.  Once the potatoes are cooked, drain them and put them in a big mixing bowl, add some soy or almond milk, and salt and pepper and turn the mix master on.  Or.... you can build yourself some upper body strength and mashed those things yourself.  I prefer pull ups to hand mashing, myself.

8.  Lay the lentil mix in the bottom of a giant casserole dish and flatten slightly.  Add a thick layer of mashed potatoes on top.  Put this in the oven for 30 - 45 minutes at 350 degrees.  Watch it and look for a slight browning on the potatoes.  Remember, everything is really already cooked, now it's just marrying and combining until bubbly goodness.

9.  You can make the vegan gravy near the end of cook time for the Shepherd's pie.  Recipe to follow after some photos.

                                                                                                     

This is the saute pan full of onion, garlic, carrots, tomatoes, spices, and kale.

Blurry photo of the lentil vegetable mix laid into the bottom of the casserole dish.  No need to use any extra oil to grease the casserole dish.  Just layer in the goodness and add potatoes.....

After mashing the potatoes with almond milk and salt and pepper I scooped them on top of the lentil veggie mix and then popped the whole thing in the oven (uncovered) for about 30 minutes or so.  It browned right up and we slathered it with vegan gravy and ate it next to a HUGE side of broccoli.

Yum Yum Yum!  

                                                                 

Vegan Gravy

1 vegetable bullion cube

2 cups water

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

few good dashes garlic powder

2 - 4 heaped tablespoons Nutritional Yeast

 few good dashes soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon yellow mustard

1/4 - 1/2 cup flour (as needed, use brown rice flour if gluten sensitive)

1 tablespoon vegan margarine

sea salt and pepper to taste

Here's a little succulent spot I love.

 1.  Combine all ingredients in pot and bring to a boil.

2.  Cook on medium heat until thick.  I use a whisk and stir stir stir so it doesn't get lumpy.

You can add a pinch of sage, rosemary, or oregano to the gravy.

Easy peasy to prepare.  Maybe 10 minutes.

OK, that's it on the food front.  Now if you want a bit more entertainment and a little hint about who else I am (other than this really big advocate for eating lots of vegetables and good things like lentils) then keep reading.....

I always put photos of my dogs in my blog posts.  Here is our little old lady cat, Momo.  I was taking a photo of the new art I framed. I got this silk screen print from a yard sale.  It was in a frame and the mat had been signed by the artist.  The frame was old and yucky.  I took the print to our local frame shop and had a new mat cut and framed it up.  While I was taking a photo to send to my daughter, Momo appeared and decided to be in the photo too.  Her orange coloring kind of matches the print.  She misses my daughter (who is allergic to her, by the way!)

My husband recently spent an entire weekend helping a friend put in skylights.  While he was gone I sewed and sewed and sewed!  This is the Farmer's Market bag I made.  I love it.  I have about 10,000 yards of fabric in my sewing closet and I plan to make everyone I know a FM bag for Christmas!  Then, see, you have to go to the FM and fill it with kale, peaches, radishes, lettuce, beets, peppers, etc....

And finally... the purse I made myself.  It is reversible but I like this side the best.  I have a request or two in for these as gifts.  I guess I better send my husband off again so I can sew to my heart's content!

Gotta make some dinner.  We are having baked yams, green sorrel soup, brown rice, and a huge salad with garbanzo beans, olives, and nuts.  What are you having?

Be well, everyone!  Namaste'

Getting Ready for the Work Week.....

Buddha Dog with heart rocks and succulents.

Getting Ready for the Work Week.....

I admit that I love to putter in my home.  As a child I used to spend hours in my bedroom making "arrangements".  This consisted of creatively and thoughtfully setting up my knick knacks in a way that was pleasing to me.  That childlike love of putting things in a way that is pleasing is still very much with me ---- now I just have much more space and many many more things to arrange!  So many, in fact, that my home is a bit unorganized.  It's usually clean and presentable but fairly unorganized.  Still, I love to have things around me that are pleasing and calming like the Buddha dog, heart rocks that my family has found on various hikes, some rocks from my friend, Laurie, and a couple succulents given to me as gifts.  I have these sitting by the little sink on my kitchen island. 

Sunday mornings are a time I am often at home with no agenda (except the one in my head which is often large and unattainable!).  I often prepare food for the upcoming week.  This is a wonderful form of puttering for me.  I wash, chop, cook, and in between do laundry, write some e-mails, a blog, play scrabble. Some of my friends and family think that we eat extraordinary things all week long but the reality is that we live on a fairly simple diet of green smoothies, grains, beans, fresh fruit, and vegetables.  Every week we eat bowls and bowls of fresh green salads, a stir fry or two, rice and beans, tons of kale and other greens, a soup or stew, nuts and seeds, green soup of the week and seasonal fruit and berries.  It's fairly simple food but there is a wash, chop, fix component that can sometimes be overwhelming on a week night after a long day of work. So Sunday morning puttering is a good time to put some of it together.

Today I prepared things for the upcoming week.  It was easy and took me about an hour.  This will save me lots of time during the week and more importantly there will be food here at home to tempt me rather than following my very hungry gut to some food source outside my home which may not be quite so healthy and organic.

The first thing I did was wash a bunch of lettuce, chop some fresh farmer's market carrots, and a big organic red bell pepper.   I combined all of it into two large gallon zip lock bags in the fridge.  Easy peasy.  Now we have 2 or 3 big salads that simply need some additions.  Our salads usually consist of:

A base of lettuce and other vegetables that keep for a few days once cut

Chopped vegetables that don't keep once they are cut - cucumber, tomatoes, etc

Some sort of bean.  Right now we are loving garbanzo beans.

Some sort of nut or seed - sunflower seed, pumpkin seed, hemp seed, chia

Live food like sprouts (easy to buy at our local Farmer's Markets and even easier to do yourself!)

A healthy fat like avocado or green olives

A simple dressing of flax oil, vinegar, salt, pepper and nutritional yeast

 Here's a sampling of a salad I made for myself the other day.  This is a "meal" salad and consists of all the things I listed above.  It's huge but that was my entire dinner. So Yum!

 Here's the big salad prep I did for the next few days.  A head of romaine chopped, a big bag of mixed greens from the farmer's market, 5 or 6 chopped carrots, and a huge red bell chopped.

And into two big bags it goes.  This photo doesn't do it justice.  It's like the color of Christmas in a bag and there is actually tons and tons of salad here. 

While I was chopping and washing the salad I had a big pot of lentils cooking.  Lentils are full of protein and a fast cook.  I'll use these lentils in a Lentil Shepherd's pie later this week.  They'll keep just fine in the fridge for a couple days before I mix a bunch of lovely tomato and veg into the lentils and cover it with super delicious mashed potatoes.

The lentils cooked and rinsed and ready to sit in the fridge until I use them on Monday or Tuesday.

The other things I got ready were:

Kale and Beans.  I washed and tore 3 huge bunches of kale in preparation for a big stir fry and a kale and bean soup.  I started soaking some lovely beans to add to that kale and bean soup (which will be made in the pressure cooker - quite a quick way to make a big soup for the week).  I'll bag the kale for future use and just be able to pull it out.

When I wash kale my three dogs sit at the kitchen screen door and look at me adoringly.  With their beautiful eyes they are saying, "Please give me the kale stems.  I love you but I really love kale."

I also made a big batch of brown rice in the rice cooker.  We'll use this for "rice bowls" (a stand by meal for us - rice or grain, beans, Annie's spread, avocado, fresh vegetables, kim chi, etc).  We'll also use this for the stir fry tonight.

I believe strongly that I make better food choices if I have food ready to eat and use.  I think one of the ways we stay healthy and strong is to eat as close to home as possible.  Although we do love to eat out at some of the local restaurants that cater to healthy eating, we just eat better if we have some stuff here and ready.  I urge you to consider spending an hour or so in your kitchen getting stuff ready to use for the next few days or week.