Ghostly Shepherd's Pie and other Goodies

This one's from my magazine archives ya'll.  I'm a sucker for those little specialty cooking magazines at the checkout.  I pulled out the Halloween themed ones to look through and found this recipe in a Fall 2001 Pillsbury Come & Eat magazine.  I didn't even have kids back then!  Well, actually there was a kid on the way.  I'm not real thrilled about using jarred gravy, but it's better than burgers and fries at the fast food joint right?  The original recipe called for using mashed potato flakes also, but I just couldn't bring myself to do that.  I put Mike on potato peeling duty and we had homemade.

Ghostly Shepherd's Pie

1 lb lean ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
2 1/2 cups frozen mixed vegetables
1 can Italian Style diced tomatoes, undrained
1 12 oz jar home-style beef gravy
Mashed Potatoes (I mixed in 1/4 tsp garlic powder and 1/4 cup grated parmesan to these)
1 egg slightly beaten

Heat oven to 375.  Spray large skillet with cooking spray and heat on medium-high.  Add ground beef and onion; cook and stir until thoroughly done.  Drain.

Set aside 12 peas for garnish.  Add remaining frozen vegetables, tomatoes and gravy; mix well.  Bring to boil.  Reduce to medium-low heat.  Cook 8 to 10 minutes or until veggies are crisp tender, stirring occasionally.

Add a beaten egg to your prepared mashed potatoes.  Spoon beef mixture into an ungreased 8 x 8 baking dish.  With large spoon, make 6 mounds of potatoes on top to resemble ghosts.  Place 2 reserved peas on each for eyes.  Bake 20 -25 minutes or until potatoes are set and thoroughly heated.

Last night and this morning, we had parent teacher conferences at both schools.  I'm on the hospitality committee at both and we provided dinner and breakfast.  I brought these pumpkin streusel muffins to Addie's school.  The house smelled wonderful while they were baking.  Find the recipe here.

For Caroline's teachers I made my old standby Sausage Spinach Quiche.  And from the picture you can tell I used a store-bought crust.  Oh the horror!  I don't like doing that, but I was trying not to be Superwoman and make things a little easier on myself since I was baking for two schools this time.  Find this recipe here in an old blog post.