CSA week 15 - chicken shepherd's pie

So, that shepherd's pie I mentioned in the last post. Sorry about the blurry pictures; they looked OK on the small cellphone screen.

I separated the potatoes and carrots out of the leftover roast vegetables from earlier in the week. They went into the food processor along with a bit of butter and a splash of milk and I processed it until they were smooth. I needed to add a bit more milk, but it's better to start with too little than to add too much and have to cook a potato to throw in.

Next, I chopped up a bunch of vegetables including some of this week's broccoli and turnip plus carrots and onion, fried them in butter until tender. Then I added the leftover roast onions and peppers, some frozen peas, salt, pepper, some herbs and some shredded roast chicken. Once they were hot I threw in a handful of flour and cooked a little while. Then a couple ladles of the stock and maybe a quarter cup of milk. I let that cook briefly to thicken up and then poured it out into a pie pan. The pan I was using was oven safe but if it's big enough to fry the vegetables in a single layer, it's too big for the final dish. In retrospect I could have used twice as much filling; it would have been tricky spreading the topping over a full pie pan, but it also wouldn't have produced just one serving.

A sprinkle of cheese goes on top and then the processed potatoes and carrots. 30 minutes at 350 degrees F and 5 minutes under the broiler and here's the result:

It's very tasty, which I mainly attribute to the roasted vegetables, the concentrated stock and the cheese and well worth the bother, but after cooking all day I'm more interested in a lie down than dinner.