Crispy potato and beef casserole for a hearty family dinner

With the evenings cooling down, it’s becoming time for some hearty meals for your whole family. Also, more people are cooking meals ahead of time for a couple of days. A casserole is often the answer as you can cook a whole lot in one go and have all the nutrients you want. This crispy potato and beef casserole is the love-child of cottage and shepherd’s pie but with slices of crispy potatoes instead of mashed. It also provides a good space for some cooking creativity.

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Crispy potato and beef casserole hints

When cooking something like this, always have your sofrito or mirepoix ready which are just the Italian and French names, respectively, for the trio of chopped onions, carrots and celery often used as a base for stews but also includes garlic in most cases. The major change is the neatly placed potatoes which get some beautifully crispy edges but stay buttery on the inside. You can also add a sprinkling of cayenne pepper on top and add some green beans or peas into the beef mixture.

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Have a hearty dinner tonight and maybe even tomorrow when you make this crispy potato and beef casserole for your family.

Crispy potato and beef casserole recipe

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Recipe by Marele van Zyl Course: MainCuisine: GlobalDifficulty: Easy

Servings

6-8

servings

Prep time

10

minutes

Cooking time

15

minutes

Baking Time

40

minutes

Total time

1

hour 

5

minutes

Ingredients

• 500 g 500 extra lean beef mince

• 1 1 onion finely chopped

• 2 cloves 2 garlic, crushed

• 2 2 carrots, chopped

• 2 sticks 2 celery, chopped

• ¾ cup ¾ frozen peas

• 2 tbsp 2 tomato paste

• 2 cups 2 beef or vegetable stock

• 1 heaped tsp 1 Marmite (optional)

• 1 tsp 1 thyme

• 1 dash 1 balsamic vinegar

• 1 kg 1 potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced

• cooking oil spray (I used avocado)

Method

• Brown the mince and set aside. In the same pot, add the celery, onion, garlic, thyme and carrot. Fry until soft.
• Add the Marmite, tomato paste, balsamic vinegar and bring to a boil. Deglaze with some stock before adding the rest with the meat.
• Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 10 minutes just for the gravy to reduce down slightly and thicken. Taste gravy for seasoning and season with salt and black pepper as needed.
• In the meantime preheat oven to 180°C.
• Put meat mixture in an ovenproof dish, add the frozen peas and mix to combine and lay potato slices on top, overlapping potatoes slightly as you layer them on the top of the meat mixture. Spray over the top of the potatoes with some spray oil (or olive oil in a spray bottle) and bake in the oven for approx. 45 minutes, potatoes should be lovely and golden on top.
• Sprinkle with chopped parsley (optional) and season with a little salt and black pepper over the top.
• Serve with your choice of vegetables.

Notes

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