What Goes With Shepherd’s Pie? The beauty of shepherd’s pie is that you have so many different kinds of sides to choose from and most of them are easy to prepare. Here are some of the best categories that go well with shepherd’s pie.
Choose between some easily made roasted asparagus or honey-glazed carrots. Mushy peas and mashed parsnips are great as sides, too:
- Veggies – You’re right! Most people, especially children, hate veggies. But when you pick the right ones and prepare them well, they truly balance out the heaviness of the dinner’s hero, aka, the shepherd’s pie.
- Starches – There’s already potato in the pie. So, won’t the addition of starches make the meal heavier? Not if you pick the right recipes. Try out some condensed milk bread that is so light and fluffy you won’t even feel you’ve eaten it. Or, go with traditional Yorkshire pudding to make dinner a hundred percent British affair. Dinner rolls and baked beans are other excellent sides.
- Salads – Sometimes all you need to lighten up a meal is a well-prepared salad. Salads add so much variety to the table that sometimes they can get the lion’s share of attention, too. Go with a simple beet salad that also includes arugulas, cranberries, and feta cheese, topped with olive oil and mustard.
Where Did Shepherd’s Pie Originate?
Well, now that you have the sides sorted out, why don’t you sit back and relax while you read on for some interesting trivia. You must already know that shepherd’s pie is a traditional British dish. But did you know it comes with a backstory?
Back in the 1700s, in Scotland, wives of peasants and shepherds had a tough time dealing with leftovers, especially lamb meat. Not wishing to throw away food, they turned this meat into a delicious dish with just a few additional ingredients.
The result, as we know it today, is this comfort food called shepherd’s pie. Over the years, people began to make a beef version of the shepherd’s pie, which came to be known as cottage pie.
Original Shepherd’s Pie
You probably can tell shepherd’s pie from other similar-looking dishes because of the significant topping of mashed potatoes. But did you know that the original shepherd’s pie didn’t even use potatoes?
Yes, that’s the way Scots made it. So, what did they used instead? They baked the “pie” on a pastry crust! On the crust, they threw in their leftover meat (lamb), and anything they could get their hands on to make a savory gravy. As everything combined in the oven, out came a scrumptious dish made of a bunch of leftovers.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering why it’s called a “pie”, here’s some information. The word pie here likely came from magpie, which is a bird that builds its nest with all kinds of random items.
Irish Shepherd’s Pie
When the original shepherd’s pie began to move around in the region, it halted for quite some time in Ireland and got a complete makeover.
Ireland is known for its abundant supply of potatoes. And so, they found a great opportunity to incorporate all those extra potatoes they had lying about.
How? Well, they modified the shepherd’s pie to replace the pastry crust with a generous layer of mashed potato topping.
And that’s the version of the shepherd’s pie that has become famous in the rest of the world. That’s why all modern shepherd’s pie recipes call for mashed potatoes and not pastry crusts, even though the meat and the gravy base remain almost the same.
In A Nutshell
A source of warm, comforting food for winter and fall, for most people, shepherd’s pie is reminiscent of mom’s kitchen and childhood. While the dish is popular as its Irish version containing potatoes, the original recipe with pastry crusts still exists in some regions.
No matter which version you wish to prepare though, there are some equally appetizing yet easy-to-prepare sides that the aromatic dish can pair up with. Some of these sides are so good that they can stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the shepherd’s pie on the dinner table.
But worry not, when prepared well, your shepherd’s pie will still hog the limelight as your visitors dig into a mouthful of delish meat with crunchy veggies, some royal potatoes, and a savory gravy.
