Happy Fathers Day & Gardeners Pie

Today, we all had lunch at Mum and Dad's house to celebrate Fathers Day. To make life a little easier on my Mum, I made my vegan lunch and took it with me.

I had such a success with my Soba Veganaise, a vegan version of Spaghetti Bolognaise, I decided to use a similar process and make a vegan Sherperds Pie, which I'm calling Gardeners Pie.

I've been hearing a lot about rice cauliflower, it's all over the internet and I'm dying to make a recipe using it but today I used cauliflower as one of the main ingredients, in my pie. In fact I used a whole head of cauliflower and this amazing vegetable features in both the 'meaty' filling and the creamy potato topping. I'm going to be experimenting a lot more with this vegetable it truly is a versatile veg!

Ingredients
3 Medium potatoes
1 Cauliflower
2 Tsp Vitalite
Splash of unsweetened almond milk
2 Tsp Olive oil
1 Carrot
2 Celery ribs
1 Onion
1 Courgette
½ Tin Chick peas*
3 Tsp Worcester sauce
3 Tsp Paprika
2 Tsp Garlic granules
½ Tsp Ground coriander
¼ Tsp Cinnamon
1 Tsp Onion granules
½ Tsp Balsamic vinegar
1 Cup mixed nuts - I used walnuts, cashews and pecans

Method
Peel the potatoes and add to a pan of boiling water. Cut the cauliflower in half and break one half into florets and add to the potatoes. Boil until soft, drain, add the vitalite and almond milk and mash until smooth. Add the 2 Tbsp of nutritional yeast and stir through until thoroughly mixed. If you prefer process the cauliflower, potatoes and nutritional yeast in a food processor until smooth. Set aside

While the potatoes and cauliflower are cooking add the onion, celery, carrot and courgette to a food processor and process until finely chopped, but not pureed. Heat the olive oil in a large pan and add the mixture to the pan. Saute for 5 minutes stirring all the time, if the mixture starts to stick add a splash of water.

Put the remaining half of the cauliflower in the food processor and pulse until finely shredded, it should resemble small grains of rice. Hence all the cauliflower rice recipes out there!empty the contents of your processor into a bowl and set to one side. Put the chick peas in the processor and pulse until finely chopped, you don't want to make houmous here you want some texture.

Next add the Worcester sauce, spices, shredded rice and chopped chick peas to the pan and stir to combine. Heat through for another 3-5 minutes over a low heat, stirring regularly.

Add the nuts to the food processor and pulse until finely chopped, be careful, if you have a powerful processor it may process the nuts to a paste. Add to the pan with the balsamic vinegar and stir through.

Transfer the mixture to an oven proof dish and top with the potato, cauliflower and nutritional yeast mash. Spread evenly using a fork to give a ridged effect. Bake in a moderate oven for 20 minutes or until the mash potato starts to brown in places.

Serve with a selection of green vegetables and enjoy!

Both my Mum and sister tried a little piece and both said it tasted good - result!


* You could use a whole tin of chickpeas if you want, but I made houmous with the other half!