Saulters in the {BIG} City: Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie

Sometimes you just need to cook.

Sometimes when your work days are too long, and the questions you get asked are too hard, and the patients you are seeing are too sick, sometimes you just need to chop, slice and saute. There's a quote from the movie Julie and Julia that I can't quite remember, but it goes something like: when everything goes wrong in life and nothing makes sense, I know that I can mix flour, sugar and eggs and it always makes a cake.

And sometimes you just need comfort food. For me growing up, comfort food always involved mashed potatoes. Mom often cooked "veggie plates" for dinner. I would consistently request mashed potatoes (I still can hear her hand mixer hit the stainless steel pan she mashed up the potatoes in) and she would always add in some sort of peas or beans for protein like any good mom would. And one of my favorite things was to mix the two together. Gross? Maybe, but I think it's delish!

A while back I made shepherd's pie for our small group and used lamb. However, I recently stumbled on a recipe for a veggie shepherd's pie, using lentils as the meat. I was a little skeptical, and needless to say Stuart was a little skeptical, but I attempted it tonight anyway. I learned some things:

1. Parsnips are delicious. You can mix them half and half with potatoes and when you mash them, the parsnips give such flavor that you don't really even need to season it!

2. Lentils take a really long time to cook. But they are tasty! And oh so healthy. A few days ago I had considered sprouting some because sprouting them increases their nutritional value. But then I found out the recent E coli outbreak in Europe came from sprouts.

3. It's amazing how much better I feel after spending some time in the kitchen.