Meat And Potato Pie
Video can’t be displayed
This video is not available.
March 12, 2025: As Saint Patrick's Day approached, I prepared to make a recipe I'd seen online for a so-called "Irish meat and potato pie." It looked good, and I was psyched for it. However, examining the recipe revealed it to be...not so good. For starters, the recipe called for half a head of chopped cabbage...then it didn't say what to do with the cabbage! Also, the ingredients had barely any spices at all, and that made me worry that it would have a bland flavor; especially since, again, it was supposed to use a lot of cabbage.
So...rather than follow the recipe, I decided to improvise. And the result of improvising was a dish similar to shepherd's pie (or cottage pie)...except that rather than a typical dish of ground beef covered with mashed potatoes, this dish kicks it up a notch! What we have here is a base of cooked beef in hearty gravy, covered with a layer of Irish-style colcannon.
Pans needed: Stock pot at least 4 to 5 quarts in size, for cooking potatoes and cabbage. 2-quart saucepan to boil carrots. And a large 12-inch cast iron skillet to prepare beef...and bake the finished pie. Don't forget a spatula for cooking the beef, and a potato masher for the colcannon.
Ingredients
- 1/2 head cabbage, roughly chopped
- 5 to 6 red potatoes, diced large (pieces about 1 inch each in size)
- 3 carrots, cut into small slices
- 1 1/2 pounds chuck roast, cut into small pieces (or 1 1/2 pounds ground beef)
- 1 chopped onion
- 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) butter, separated into three 4-tablespoon pieces
- 1 tablespoon (about 2 ounces) tomato paste
- 1/4 cup flour
- 3 cups beef broth
- 1 12-ounce bottle of beer
- 1 cup milk
- 8 ounces shredded cheddar cheese (or your favorite cheese topping)
- Spices:
- 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
- 1 tablespoon dried basil
- 2 to 3 tablespoons dried parsley
- 2 tablespoons salt
- 2 to 3 teaspoons ground black pepper
Chop up ingredients: red potatoes, cabbage, carrots, onion, and chuck roast. Of course, if you're using ground beef instead of chuck roast, you don't have to chop it. However, using chuck roast will give you a rich beefy flavor, and it will help produce an outstanding gravy.
Place a large cast iron skillet on the stovetop, and turn the stovetop burner to medium heat. Let it heat for at least 10 minutes. While the cast iron pan is heating, prepare the boiled potatoes and cabbage: Add the potatoes to a large stock pot, and cover with the chopped cabbage. Add 1 tablespoon salt (half the salt listed in the ingredients). Add 2 quarts water to the pot, and one 12-ounce bottle of beer. Add 1 4-tablespoon piece of butter. Cover the pot and bring to a boil. Boil for a total of 50 minutes, including the time needed to heat up the water to boiling.
In a separate saucepan, add carrot pieces and about 1 cup of water. Cover the saucepan and simmer the carrots until soft.
While the vegetables are boiling, preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit, and begin preparing the beef.
Add the beef to the cast iron pan, and cook until the beef is done. Because the beef is in small pieces, this should take about 10 to 15 minutes. When the beef is almost completely cooked, add chopped onion and stir fry everything until the onions are soft and the beef is cooked.
When the beef and onions are ready, add 1 4-tablespoon piece of butter to the pan with the meat, and stir it as it melts. Add flour and mix it all together to make a roux, stirring for at least a minute to cook the flour. Add tomato paste and mix it into the roux, cooking for at least another minute. At this point, add 1 cup beef broth to the pan and stir it all together into a beefy gravy. The liquid will reduce and thicken into gravy. Keep adding liquid and reducing it, until all of the beef broth has been used and you have a pan full of beef and thick gravy. The gravy can be very thick, because it's going to be the base layer of the pie! Add salt and paper to taste, and add dried thyme and rosemary. Turn off the heat and let the gravy congeal, while preparing the colcannon.
After 50 minutes, drain water from the stock pot with potatoes and cabbage. Into the pot of hot vegetables, add the last piece of butter, along with basil, parsley, and milk. Grab your masher and mash it all together into colcannon: a tasty mashed potato and cabbage dish.
Drain the simmered carrots and onions, and spread them on top of the beef and gravy in the cast iron skillet. For the top layer, spread the colcannon mash over the beef and vegetables, and cover it as best as possible without pushing it down into the meat.
Cover the top of the pie with shredded cheese. Bake the entire dish in the oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes.
If you serve the dish right away, it will of course be piping hot. If you let it sit for a while, the dish will solidify into a solid mass.