My sister made me this dish a couple weeks ago when I had dinner with her and I was surprised how much I loved it. Not that I should ever be surprised by how much I like stuff she feeds me; she is a fantastic cook and she constantly makes dishes I would never think to make and then I love them. Just like this one. I have made it a couple times since then. It has that perfect comfort food, wintery casserole heartiness but it is still really healthy and packed with vegetables. Perfect fall hibernation food.
Lentil soup shepherd's pie
large yellow onion, sliced
3-4 cloves garlic, smashed
1-2 shallots, sliced
5 slicks of celery, sliced
2 large sweet potatoes, cubed
1 butternut squash, small pumpkin, acorn squash or any winter squash, cubed
2 large tomatoes, diced
6 large carrots, sliced
1 cup peas
2 cups dried lentils, soaked or 2 tins lentils
2 cups chickpeas, cooked or 2 tins chickpeas
1 cube of vegetable bouillon
1-2 big bunches kale, chopped
3 large potatoes, peeled and chopped
a little olive oil or butter
1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese
1 package seitan, or a cup of homemade seitan, diced
Sauté onion, shallot, celery and garlic with a little olive oil in a large soup pot. When they begin to sweat and colour, add diced sweet potato, carrots and squash. Once the vegetables are a little browned and soft, add water to cover all the vegetables and bouillon. Add diced tomatoes, lentils and chickpeas. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer. Add the chopped kale once the soup has thickened quite a bit.
Put potatoes in a medium pan, cover with cold water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat slightly and simmer until potatoes are soft and slightly crumbly when pierced with a fork. Drain the potatoes and mash them with olive oil and 1/4 cup shredded cheese.
Brown the seitan in a skillet with a little oil.
Fill a casserole dish 3/4 full of lentil soup. Top with browned seitan. Spread mashed potatoes over top. Sprinkle remaining cheese, salt and pepper on top. Bake at 400 until potatoes are golden brown on top.
Eat steaming hot.
what is seitan??
ReplyDeleteIt's a gluten based meat substitute. Like tofu but made out of wheat.
ReplyDeleteI'd never heard of seitan either until your recipe. Then today I came across an article on it, with recipes, in the August 2012 issue of Alive Magazine.
ReplyDeleteThe link is below in case you're interested.
http://www.alive.com/articles/view/23611/seitan
Seitan doesn't seem to be as well known as other vegetarian proteins like tofu. It's really versatile though. I like to mince it really fine and brown it like you would ground meat. It is an easy protein boost to lots of dishes.
ReplyDelete