S and I sought comfort food this weekend. Something to do with gale force winds. So, here is the recipe (for his benefit really, because he asked me how I made it), for Laura’s Shepards’ Pie. Completely invented and no recipe followed. Though the onion marmalade is nigella lawson’s idea.

approx 500 grams of lamb pieces
1 large onion
salt, pepper
2 tablespoons of home made onion marmalade
1 tablespoonful of tomato puree
1 stem of rosemary, fresh from the balcony, chopped finely
1 teaspoonful (heaped) of mint sauce
one third of a bottle of white wine approximately

finely chop onion, place in saucepan with olive oil, salt, pepper. sweat.
chop up the lamb pieces into very fine pieces, season with salt and pepper and throw a fistful of flour over it. transfer to sweated onion saucepan and fry.
finely chop the rosemary and add to lamb. stir.
add tomato puree, onion marmalade, mint sauce.
stir until meat is cooked.
when the lamb is cooked, add the wine.
bring to boil and reduce to simmer.

peel 4-5 potatoes. boil.
when boiled, strain them into a colander.
use a colander. failure to use a colander results in soggy potatoes.
in the potato saucepan, add a slice of butter.
add some milk. heat up but do not bring to a boil.
add potatoes back in. mash.
season mash with salt, pepper, (freshly ground, both), one teaspoon of mustard and one teaspoon of mint sauce.

transfer the simmering lamb to an oven proof dish. spread out evenly.
place mashed potatoes on top of the lamb mixture. spread out evenly. a sharp chopping knife is very useful for spreading out evenly.
place in an oven at 180 degrees centigrade (ours is a fan assisted oven) and leave in the oven for approximately 50 minutes.

serve. yum. burning hot though. maybe leave cool for five minutes before serving.