I like Shepherd’s Pie. It’s comforting and warm and stick-to-your-ribs good food. Perfect for the winter!
I haven’t tried making a vegan Shepherd’s Pie before but I am pretty happy with these results. The mushrooms and lentils do a good job of giving a ‘meaty’ texture to the dish. The butternut squash chunks give a little bit of extra fun too.
I served this to meat eaters for dinner and they said they enjoyed it quite a lot.
Vegan Shepherd's Pie
Ingredients
- 4 cups cooked lentils or 2 cans of lentils, drained and rinsed
- 1 lb mushrooms, sliced (I used a mix of cremini and white mushrooms)
- 1 onion, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- ½ cup frozen green peas
- 1½ cups butternut squash, cubed
- 2 cups hot water
- 2 tablespoons vegan 'beef' bouillon powder
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- Salt & lots of fresh ground black pepper, to taste
- 8 large potatoes, peeled and cubed
- 3 tablespoons vegan margarine
- 3-4 tablespoons plain unsweetened almond milk
- 1 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- In a large skillet heat oil over medium heat. Saute onion and garlic until they start to soften.
- Add mushrooms and saute until softened and starting to brown.
- Add butternut squash. Stir to combine. Cover and let cook until almost fully tender.
- Add lentils and green peas and warm through.
- In a measuring cup or small bowl mix hot water, vegan bouillon powder and cornstarch. Mix into the lentil/mushroom mixture and stir until thickened. If the mixture gets too thick, you can add more broth or water.
- Taste and adjust for seasoning.
- Meanwhile, boil potatoes in a pot with enough water to cover. Once fork-tender, drain and mash.
- Add vegan margarine and almond milk and mash until you reach a nice smooth consistency. If necessary, add more milk to get a smooth creamy mixture.
- Add salt, to taste.
- Heat oven to 350°F.
- Transfer lentil mixture to a casserole dish. Top with mashed potato mixture. Place uncovered in heated oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until completely heated through and topping gets slightly browned.
I have to say I am quite happy with how this turned out. Because I felt like spoiling ourselves a bit I sprinkled on a bit of truffle salt after plating. It kind of took a homespun classic and made it that much more upscale.
Yum…Looks great! I am also a gluten free vegan…nice to meet you 🙂
Thanks and welcome to my little corner of the web! It is very nice to meet you as well.
OMG…made this and it was DELISHIOUS!!!
Looks so delicious. 🙂 I will try it this weekend.
Hello. I was wondering if you can substitute the potatoes for sweet potatoes?
I would definitely give mashed sweet potatoes a go in this recipe. You probably won’t need to actually whip up the potatoes with vegan margarine and non-dairy milk, but simply mashing cooked sweet potatoes should be sufficient. Let us know how it turned out!
My new favorite recipe! I made half cauliflower and half potato mash instead of all potato and it is fantastic!
Yum! Love cauli-mash. I’ll have to try that out myself Helen! Thanks for sharing.
a tip I learned from America’s test kitchen is to put dried porcini mushrooms in a grinder to make powder and add that along with a few shakes of soy sauce to make a beef flavor is you don’t have vegan beef boullion
Love that tip! Thanks for sharing Cindy!