to say that cottage pie is NOT a “weekday meal”

[RiddleMeThis2018]

Cottage pie is delicious. I know how to make it, but sometimes I like to look at a recipe online, to make sure I don’t put too much tomato in by mistake (disappointing, not to be recommended). Almost ALL the recipes say “delicious week-night supper” or similar. This is NOT a weeknight supper!! I couldn’t do it yesterday because the DCs and I got back from swimming too late. I’m not even working today and I had to psych myself up to it. The mince takes 50 mins to simmer, and that’s after all the chopping. Then there’s 20 mins in the oven assuming you time the potatoes right. And then the washing up!

I don’t blame cottage pie. I blame the website writers who want to make me think I should just whip this up on a Thursday when I get in from work. AIBU?

Thermidor? Can't even spell it ...

One of my sisters is always saying shit like how she can't understand anyone who can't just knock up a perfectly delicious and healthy stir fry in ten minutes (hi sis !) but in real actual life has someone else do all the chopping and then burns it and blamed the pan

Never in my life did I imagine that in 2019 there would be so many 'emaciipated' women arguing over what a shepherds pie is and how to make one.

What makes you assume all the posters are women?

I won’t eat mince unless it’s been simmered for at least an hour and q half. Not a weekday meal here!

@moon2 I feel like, after 22 pages of posts about mince, you have rediscovered my original point, which was about recipes exaggerating the simplicity and downplaying the time involved in “family meals”, making us feel like we’re somehow failing if we can’t knock up a shepherd’s pie on a Tuesday. So thank you! I apologise if some of you think this is silly. I’ve really enjoyed reading it all, and can’t tear myself away!

Make the mince mixture in advance. Then you can easily assemble a cottage pie for a weekday meal.

Definitely a weekday meal in our house and both of us work!

Sometimes would make the mince and sauce Pre leaving for the school run.

Full roast dinner with Yorkshire puds and a desert is the only ‘need a weekend day to prep it meal!’ Mini roast without all the works also available Monday to Friday!

How about this one? 6 hours 30 mins!

www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/lamb-recipes/shepherd-s-pie/

Riddleme my fave thread of the moment and yes urgh to the posters who can peel and boil a pan of potatoes in 10 mins - yeah right 🙄

I’m on the side of ‘not a Hope in hell is that a weekday meal’ unless it’s been made up in advance and frozen ready to go in the oven. Same as lasagne, fish pie, mousaka and anything else that’s is first cooked on the hob then put in the oven. We get home between 5.30 and 6 (when I’m not on mat leave) and I then need to get the toddler fed sitting down at 6.30 latest. I’m usually trying to cook while placating a tired hungry toddler and I’m probably also hugely inefficient but by the time I’ve chopped veg, sautéed it all off added quorn/lentils (veggie DH), added tomatoes / liquid the pan based bit has taken me the best part of 45 mins along with running in and out to get potatoes from the garage, stuff from the garage etc. Cleared and washed up as I go along, then it goes in the oven for 30-45 mins at least. I bow to those more efficient!

OMG!!! That Jamie Oliver recipe looks absolutely delicious, 6.5 hours - love it! There'll be a poster along in a minute whose knocked it out in 30 mins though obviously...

Boobahs that’s insane.

I literally made one tonight

Week day meal for us, in fact we're having cottage pie tomorrow 🍽

I'll be in the kitchen at 6.15am frying the mince to get it all in the slow cooker beford I leave for work. All I have to do after work is the mash and veggies and tea is on the table 👍

@NoNewsisGood that is not cottage pie, that's mince and a blob of potatoes. Not the same at all!
OP, I did it today and it did take 45 mins, plus oven time. I don't cook the mince for 50 mins though, just about 15 mins, then slow in the oven for about an hour.
The reason it's a midweek meal is because it's not nice enough to be a special, fancy-nancy weekend meal. Weekend meals have pizzazz. Cottage pie is comfort food you could eat with a spoon (if you wanted to). So batch and freeze, then it's easy.
Mmm yum.

My DP can make a cottage pie in about 35 minutes. It's disgusting and tastes like a cottage.

I've just read ModreB's wY of cooking mince and I actually feel quite sick. You can't possibly cook mince that quickly 😣

I always make three big pie dishes and freeze them and cook one of them. Easy peasy. Definitely the simplest food out there unless people can stomach junk and takeaway

Oh my... i think i will never eat cottage pie again... please let me unsee what i have just read...

We're writing Daily Mash copy now, right?

This thread is an eye opener! My cottage pie takes next to no time to cook. I do the potatoes in the instant pot and just do mince with gravy, serving veggies on the side. I have no idea how it tastes as I don't eat beef. But my kids wolf it down and I have had several adults tell me it's great. Obviously my circle are easily pleased

@Riddlemethis2018..you’re welcome! I might add to your joy and even admit that whatever my mum and I cook whether from a book or family recipes it always seems to take 2 hours from fridge to table apart from omelette, chops, steamed fish or pasta that is, but then we’re not Italian so we don’t feel a massive cultural weight of generations to produce fresh pasta. Maybe it’s because we don’t like meat rare and cook it longer with wine or homemade whizzed up sauces. Can’t handle veg al dente either.

Are you for real OP? 50 minutes to simmer the mince?! 😂😂😂. I can make a shepherds/cottage pie in 30 minutes

Jamhandprints what every single meal on every single weekend has to have pizzazz?! Seriously?

Yes but Lulu as we have ascertained over the last 23 pages, there is Shepherd's/Cottage Pie and there is proper Shepherd's/Cottage Pie