I nearly didn’t include this in my book because it’s just a basic mince stew, but it was such a staple in our house growing up and it’s such comfort food that I felt I had to! There were times when we were growing up when money was tight, I remember my mum talking about having no money and making such statements as “Right. That’s it, we’re going on an economy drive. We’re just going to eat mince!”
We loved this stew with dumplings, or she would make it into cottage pie, or a pastry plate pie, which was also Nanna’s forte! It’s great if you make a big batch of mince stew and freeze it so that when it comes to cooking you can just defrost it and add dumplings, potatoes or pastry!
Ingredients
· 500g mince meat
· 500ml beef stock
· Approximately 2-3 carrots, finely diced
· Approximately 2 sticks celery, finely chopped
· 1 leek
· 1 onion, finely chopped
· 6 mushrooms
· 1 large teaspoon marmite
· Salt and pepper
Method
· Brown the mince in a large frying pan.
· Add the onions, leek, carrot, celery and mushrooms and let simmer for about 5 minutes.
· Add the teaspoon marmite and 500ml beef stock, bring to the boil and then turn to a low simmer for at least 45 minutes.
· Season to taste. (Depending on what beef stock you use you may need to add extra for taste).
Dumplings
Makes 8
Ingredients
· 4oz self-raising flour
· 2oz suet
· salt
· leaves from 2 stalks of thyme
· 5 tablespoons water
Method
· Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl until it forms a sticky dough. Roll the dumplings into balls and put into the simmering stew and let bubble with a lid on for about 20 minutes.
Cottage Pie
Make the mince stew as above. Just reduce down the liquid a bit or drain it off so it’s not swimming in gravy. Transfer to an ovenproof dish, let cool and top with mashed potato.
Perfect Mash
As the mash is going on top of the mince it is best to keep it quite dense and not add any milk or cream, which I would normally do when serving mash as an accompaniment.
Ingredients
· 1kg potatoes
· 4oz butter
· Salt and pepper
Method
· Peel potatoes, put in a large pan of cold water. Bring to the boil , turn heat down and simmer for 20 minutes.
· Remove from heat, drain , return to pan, add the butter and season and mash.
Plate Pie
Cook the mince as above
To make the pastry:
Ingredients
· 12oz flour
· 4oz lard
· 2oz margarine/butter
· 1 tablespoon water
Method
· Make the pastry, or use shop bought if pushed for time! Rest in fridge, then cut pastry in half, roll out into two discs, one the size of pie plate and the other slightly larger .
· Put the same size disc on bottom of the pie plate, add the mince (reserving the juice). Then top with the slightly larger pastry disc and prick the middle with a fork, Cook in oven (180°c) for 30-40 minutes.
