Cottage Pie – Ground Beef Potato Casserole

Anyone who has ever spent a long time in Great Britain like me will have definitely fallen in love with this classic British cuisine - the cottage pie, a ground beef potato casserole with beef stock and Worcester sauce (or maybe your "cousin" the shepherd's pie, made with lamb).

I am introducing a variation of this dish today, with some of the potatoes used for the mashed potatoes (or "topping") being replaced by parsnips, which gives the "topping" a slightly sweet note while the meat has a slightly bitter taste due to the Worcestershire sauce. Since a very old name for parsnips is also "Germanenwurzel", I call this dish the slightly German version.

If you don't like this idea, please use 1 kilogram of potatoes for the mashed potatoes and leave out the parsnips.

First set up a large saucepan with water and wash, peel and cut the potatoes and parsnips. Cook on medium heat for 20 minutes.

Then peel the onion and garlic, chop finely and sauté in olive oil until translucent.

When that's done, take it out of the pan / wok and fry the minced meat well over high heat. The meat should turn out crumbly and brown (not gray - because then it has been boiled and not fried and the taste is not that good).

As soon as the meat is crumbly, add the onions and garlic again, then also add the Worcester sauce and mix well. Salt and pepper to taste.

Deglaze with the beef stock, bring to the boil and then simmer on low to medium heat for about 30 minutes. The liquid should have more or less evaporated by the end of the cooking time, but be careful not to burn the meat.

With the carrots you have the choice whether you want to pre-cook them separately or simply mix them with the minced meat sauce. I opted for the latter variant and added it to the simmering minced meat mixture.

Add the frozen peas to the minced meat mixture approx. 5 minutes before the end of the cooking time.

Now the potatoes and parsnips can be removed from the stove and the water poured off.

Let it evaporate briefly and then mash with a potato masher or food processor with a sip of milk or a little butter to a paste.

Meanwhile preheat the oven to 165 degrees top-bottom heat.

When the meat is ready, remove it from the heat and place in a greased casserole dish. Press down a little with a spoon so that the cottage pie doesn't fall apart afterwards. ^^

Spread the mashed potatoes on top and also press down with a spoon.

[The British like to make decorative patterns on the mashed potatoes with a spoon or fork, but we save that today.]

Now sprinkle with the Parmesan or optionally the breadcrumbs and put the pan in the oven.

Approx. Bake for 30 minutes until the surface is golden brown. There are breadcrumbs on my cottage pie because my blackhead is not allowed to eat that much cheese. However, it tastes much better with cheese.

When the baking time is over, take it out of the oven, let it cool down for approx. 10 minutes, cut it and serve.

[And if the cottage pie doesn't fall apart when you cut it, you can pat yourself on the shoulder and say "well done"!]

Bon appetit!