Chocolate Shepherd's Pie - We Should Cocoa 18

Well this may not bear much resemblance to shepherds pie as most know it - it is vegetarian after all - but it's what I call shepherds pie. Normally I make this with lentils, but I thought I'd try a version using Quorn mince this time instead as I happened to have some languishing in the freezer. I was also keen to incorporate chocolate, as this month's We Should Cocoa challenge was to make a savoury vegetarian dish and I thought chocolate would give an added depth of flavour to a much loved (by me at any rate) dish.

This is what I did:

• Scrubbed some of our Sarpo potatoes.
• Placed in a pan with a large clove of garlic and boiled until soft.
• Drained off the water and mashed with some sour cream and 1/8 tsp sea salt.

• Put a glug of olive oil into a large pan.
• Threw in 1 large onion - chopped.
• Diced 3 large carrots and put those in too.
• Added a few sprigs of thyme, a couple of bay leaves and 3 Cornish pepper leaves.
• Fried until the onion was soft.
• Added two large cloves of garlic - chopped & a 1/4 tsp dried thyme.
• Threw in 300g Quorn mince, rather more frozen sweetcorn than I intended as my hand slipped when adding it to the pan and a tin of mixed beans.
• Ground in some black pepper, added some shoyu and a pinch of sea salt.
• Left to simmer with the lid on for 20 minutes.
• Took off the heat.
• Added 40g 70% dark chocolate (G&B) and left to melt.

• Buttered a casserole dish and spooned in the mince.
• Spread the mashed potato over the top and dotted with small pieces of butter.
• Baked at 180C for 30 minutes until bubbling and nicely browned on top.

The photographs are not great: firstly it was dark and secondly, it's just hard to make brown mush look really appealing in a photograph. It was, in actuality though, very appealing. The Quorn mince worked well, although I think I prefer my lentil version. I was absolutely right about the addition of chocolate though. It made this savoury dish, somehow even more savoury. Does chocolate, perhaps, contain that elusive umami flavour? It also gave a nice rich brown colour to the gravy and had a thickening effect too. This is perfect winter fare and I shall be using chocolate in my shepherd's pies from now on in.

For further inspiration - or not - here are some other chocolate savoury posts I've done:

• Chocolate Stuffed Chillies
• Mushroom & Chocolate Risotto
• Chocolate & Chilli Lime Bread
• Cocoa Refried Beans