Shepherd's pie calzone

So, I had a lot of leftover mashed potatoes and meat filling from my Shepherd's pie experiment yesterday.

I decided to make use of them this morning:

Shepherd's pie calzone.

When I asked one of my sisters about what my mom put in the Shepherd's pie she remembered it having carrots and peas. 

This did not match my memory of the recipe.

I called my other sister this morning and asked about her memories of the recipe. She remembered my mother putting a layer of canned corn between the meat and mashed potatoes - which was exactly what I remembered.

So, this morning I started with trying to make Shepherd's pie fritters.

I thawed one of the pieces of pizza dough I had in the freezer and rolled it out.

Leftover mashed potatoes and some defrosted frozen corn.

A little bit of the Shepherd's pie meat mixture.

Another piece of dough on top.

Pinch it into a nice tidy bundle.

A few minutes in hot oil and ta da!!

The first one turned out perfect but the idea of making 50 teeny tiny Shepherd's pie fritters was not appealing this morning.

So, the Shepherd's pie fritter experiment turned into a Shepherd's pie calzone.

A few minutes in the oil and...

A thing of beauty.

The taste of the red wine seemed to have mellowed out overnight or the addition of sweet corn balanced out the flavor - I am not sure which.

Either way it was delicious! 

The dogs were sitting politely by the table (drooling) while I was eating this.

Yes, they did get a nibble of the crust that had no trace of onions whatsoever:-)

Shepherd's Pie take 1

Shepherd's pie.

I have been working on perfecting my Shepherd's pie recipe.

Today's attempt? Well, it wasn't perfect...


So, no recipe today but I will show you what it looked like.

I didn't let the sauce thicken up enough and the extra liquid came bubbling out the top.

I made a small portion for my friend to taste test. She said she liked it but I guess I am a harsher critic.

I really liked the Parmesan topping.

I don't think I will add red wine to the next one. I just didn't like how it ended up tasting. 

Next time I think I will try a version of the Shepherd's pie my mom used to make. 

And I am going to go to the bother of picking up grass-fed beef from Whole Foods because the regular 'ol ground beef I picked up Safeway tasted incredibly bland.

I do have some leftover mashed potato and sauce so I will have to find a creative use for them.

I hope everyone is having a great Saturday!

Oops, my trip to Ikea

Oops, I forgot to tell you about my trip to Ikea.

The first thing we did when we got there was to grab something eat because it was getting on 2:30pm and neither of us had eaten lunch yet.

A new lower price on meatballs?? It must be my lucky day!

And this is why you should not let yourself get too hungry, instead of ordering the small plate of meatballs (which I really wanted) I ordered the combo plate because my stomach was screaming at me to eat everything in sight.

My friend got the same (she asked for veggies instead of mashed potatoes) and some kind of green dessert.

And I did grab something new to try:

This tasted kinda chamomile-y and way too sweet. I was not a fan.

I felt bad in the end because it was way too much food for me to finish - but I did love the mashed potatoes and swedish meatballs.

Although, I doubt I will ever understand why they include jam with the meatballs.

The lunch room was beautiful.

And don't get me wrong, I love Ikea, but the endless amount of choices does make the whole experience kind of mind numbing.

I hope everyone is having a great Sunday!

Vegetarian eggs benedict

This morning I felt like making one of my million different versions of eggs benedict.

I was also interested in trying out the nutritional yeast in another recipe.

I wanted to have the egg sit on a bed of mashed potatoes but I didn't feel like going through all the work to make them. 

Instead I shredded one medium potato and two carrots and steamed them. I blanched some spinach for some greens.

The potato carrot mixture turned out surprisingly creamy (not exactly pretty, but, oh well).

Steamed potato and carrot mixture with blanched spinach and a poached egg.

Next was my attempt at Hollandaise sauce. Following my lazy tendencies this morning - I didn't want to bother with a roux.

I added some vegetable stock in a pan and added one and a half cups of water, one Tbsp. of yellow mustard, three Tbsp. of nutritional yeast, the juice of one and a half lemons, black pepper and in the end I did add some flour to thicken up the sauce.

The main reason I didn't want to include any dairy products in the sauce - I just didn't want to have to worry about the sauce breaking if I added in a lot of lemon juice.

The sauce turned out really lemony with a nice bite from the mustard. The cheesy flavor of the nutritional yeast took a back seat in this recipe which I think was a good thing.

I have a family party to go to later this afternoon. Who knows if I will have time to post again today.

So, on that note - Everyone have a great Sunday! 

A change of plans

I was planning on making something completely different tonight (that would have included the cucumbers) but when I discovered I was missing a key ingredient, I had to make a change of plans.

But sometimes when you are forced to adapt you end up with something that is so much better than your original plan.

Pan roasted lamb loin chop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I cooked all four of the lamb loin chops at once. I will use the three I have left over in another recipe. 

I seasoned each loin with salt and pepper and then they went into a medium hot pan with a little olive oil and seared on each side for 4 -6 minutes. Then the whole pan went under the broiler for 5 minutes. Then I pulled them out and let the meat rest for about 10 minutes.

I steamed a medium size potato and mashed it with some yogurt, Parmesan, salt and pepper.

The carrots are left over from the sushi lunch. They really are a vivid shade of orange!

I made a pan sauce from the meat drippings, 1/4 cup of white wine - let it reduce and then add in a small pat of butter to add richness. When the sauce became smooth and shiny, I pulled it off the heat and added in 2 tsp. of greek yogurt.

I do have to say that mashed potatoes and gravy are one of my favorite things on the planet.

The dogs enjoyed the left over bits of meat I didn't finish.

I had to eat early because the movie got pushed to the 5pm showing. 

Black Swan here I come!