My mama always made shepherd’s pie when my brother and I were growing up. It was easy and quick to whip up, cheap and delicious. Plus she would always make enough for leftovers and leftovers were always welcome in our house. Because I had this dish a little too much as a kid (sorry mom), I never really got a hankering for it. The other day though, for no apparent reason at all, the hankering was hanking. I had to make a shepherd’s pie.

While the traditional recipe is prepared with a layer of ground beef or lamb, mixed with veggies and spices and topped with cheesy mashed potatoes, I wasn’t really feeling the whole meat part. I am not a vegetarian. I just wasn’t craving any meat. Since I have been experimenting with making some of my favorite recipes “healthier”, I figured I would do the same with this! I have to say, this is my favorite one yet.

Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie For filling: 2 yellow onions, chopped 10 white mushrooms, diced 1 small bag of frozen green peas, thawed 1/2 teaspoon minced garlic 1 cup vegetable stock 1-2 tablespoons almond flour Salt, pepper & garlic powder For mashed potatoes: 4-5 large potatoes, chopped 2 tablespoon Earth Balance 2 tablespoons plain Greek yogurt 3/4 cup coconut milk Salt & pepper

First, preheat the oven to 400ºF. Peel and chop the potatoes and toss them into a pot of water. Bring the potatoes to a boil with salt and some Earth Balance, in place of butter. Let’s start on this here fillin’.

Heat some olive oil in a pan. Chop up the onions and sauté in the pan with some salt, pepper and garlic powder.

Next, dice the mushrooms and sauté with the onions.

Add in the thawed green peas and minced garlic. Cook about 1-2 minutes. Then pour in the veggie stock and continue to simmer. I chose to add in about 2 tablespoons of almond flour in lieu of white flour to thicken up the filling. Just eyeball this amount until you get the desired consistency. Cook until thick and no flour clumps remain.

Spoon the filling into a baking dish and move onto the best part…the potatoes.

Once the potatoes are fork tender, strain out the water and start mashin’. Side note: How freakin’ cute is this lil’ pot from Ikea?!

Add in more Earth Balance and salt and pepper as needed. Then add in the coconut milk and Greek yogurt instead of regular milk and sour cream. The amounts don’t have to be exact, but mash it all together until the potatoes are nice and creamy. I added cheddar cheese into the potatoes as well because…cheese.

Spread the mashed potatoes over the veggie layer and top with more cheddar cheese. Overkill? Not in my book.

Bake in the oven for 15 minutes or until the cheese is melted. Boom! Look at those layers. Did you even eat dinner if you didn’t Snapchat it first?

I hope you enjoyed my vegetarian take on this classic recipe!

Stay Cheesy.