Bolognese Pie

there was a debate among our friends whether what we made was cottage pie or sheppard's pie. from the net, it can be called both which is basically a meat pie made of a meat base and topped with mashed potatoes. meat can be anything from beef, mutton, game, chicken and even fish.

here is our latest fav meat pie ~ bolognese pie :)

it's basically bolognese sauce with lots of minced meat, chunky veggies such as celery, mushrooms, carrots and even peas if you like.

we, cheated ;) we used Prego's traditional pasta sauce and added additional herbs, salt & pepper for taste.

ingredients for base:

• minced meat/chicken
• chopped big onions  5
• chopped garlic 2 heads
• Prego's pasta sauce (we made alot today, so we used 3 large bottles to get the right tomatoey taste)
• bolognese herb mix
• tomato puree (op)
• black pepper
• dried oregano
• salt
• chunky veggies: celery, mushrooms, carrots
• cooking oil

how to:

• sautee the garlic & onions till translucent
• add the minced meat and fry till well mixed & cooked thru
• add the pasta sauce as much as you need to get the taste that you want. if not enough, add some tomato paste/puree
• add herbs & seasoning to taste
• add veggies, celery last to maintain the crunch
• once all is well mixed, cooked and taste to your liking, turn off the burner

ingredients for whipped potato topping

• potatoes
• milk
• salt
• white  pepper
• butter/margerine

optional ingredient:

• mozzarella cheese

how to:

• if you want a thick topping, use as much potatoes as you can. today was a med thick topping which came from 11 potatoes. try to get the waxy ones such as russet but any potato will do (in my opinion)
• peeled & boiled till cooked, drain & then mashed.
• as you mash it finely, add bit by bit the rest of the ingredients till you get the taste & texture that you want. i use very little of butter/margerine. 

assembling:

1. pre-heat you oven for 10mins at 200C
2. in a casserole dish, put in the sauce base (as much you want)
3. top it with the mashed potatoes (as thick as you want)
4. optional ingredient: shredded mozzarella. you can put this on top of the sauce before the mashed potatoes or on top of the mashed potatoes.
5. use a fork to make sore decorative marks on the mashed potatoes or just smooth it out (op)
6. bake in the oven till the top becomes golden
7. switch off oven & take it out to serve.

 

the additional herbs












the Prego sauce

mushrooms. you can even use the fresh ones.

mozzarella cheese

 the base sauce with shredded mozzarella cheese

the  mashed potato topping

the finishing product