Shepherd’s Pie

As regular readers will know, lamb features regularly on the Dinner Diary menu. We’re both big fans and it’s a versatile meat. Simply fried with rosemary and garlic and served with sauteed potatoes, it’s a quick mid-week meal. Shoulder, cooked long and slow in a casserole is a wonderful treat on a wintery Sunday. Lamb mince however doesn’t fill me with such culinary joy.

We went through a phase of eating a lot of lamb kofte, trying different spice mixes until we got the seasoning just as we wanted. However, one fatal evening these lovingly prepared Turkish treats found their way from the freezer and into what was supposed to be an Italian style dish of (beef) meatballs with spaghetti and tomato sauce. The shock of tasting lamb when I was expecting beef and the clash of flavours put me off them completely and I haven’t eaten them since.

However, we recently had lunch at the Hinds Head in Bray which is owned by Heston Blumenthal. We were pretty certain that we would both enjoy the food (the famous triple cooked chips definitely lived up to their reputation as the best chips in the world) but neither of us expected to find a dish that would rank as one of the best we’ve ever eaten and, had I given it any thought beforehand, I wouldn’t have expected that dish to be Shepherd’s Pie. It was a joy to taste (sadly Stephen had ordered it while I opted for the steak so he got the lion’s share), the different cuts of lamb all leant different textures and the sauce was thick and full of sweet, earthy flavours.

Trying to create something similar at home was no easy task: lamb belly is hard to find and lamb shoulder generally comes in large pieces. We were almost lucky with the sweetbreads, the butcher assured us he had some but on arriving at the shop he realised they had already been saved for some other lucky shopper. So, what we ended up with was some lamb mince, neck fillet and kidney:

We started by seasoning the mince with salt and pepper. We then cut the lamb neck fillets into cubes, then skinned and cored the kidneys before cutting them into small cubes and then coating them and the neck fillet cubes in seasoned flour. We browned the meat in batches and then removing it from the pan. We deglazed the pan with some red wine and reserved those juices. Next in went the onion which we sweated off before adding the celery and carrot, last in was the garlic. When that was all cooked through, we returned the meat to the pan and added the rest of the ingredients.

The pan simmered away on a low heat for two and a half hours before we spooned it into an oven dish and topped with mustardy mashed potato. Into the oven so the potato could brown and served with a selection of vegetables.

I had some reservations about trying to re-create something that was so delicious and wondered if it would be best consigned to memory, I’m really glad we did though because this was a real triumph. Not exactly the same as the Hind’s Head version but rich and sweet and lamby nonetheless. We loved it.

Serves Four

500g lamb mince
150g lamb’s kidney, diced and dusted with seasoned flour
250g lamb neck fillet, diced
1 onion, finely diceed
1 large carrot, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, crushed
salt and pepper
1 sprig rosemary
1 sprig thyme
250ml red wine
Tablespoon tomato puree
500ml lamb stock
Tablespoon worcester sauce
100ml milk
1kg potatoes
Butter, to taste
Milk, to taste
1 tablespoon mustard