METHOD

1. Remove the lamb from the bone and dice it as finely as you like. The meat should come away easily if the original roast was cooked low and slow.
2. Heat a splash of the sun-dried tomato oil in a wide pan over medium heat and fry the onion until softened. Add the carrots, celery, and swede (or turnips if using) and continue to cook until everything begins to soften.
3. In a pestle and mortar, mash the garlic with a little salt and the sun-dried tomatoes to a rough paste. Add a splash of white wine to the mortar and scrape up any remaining bits. Pour the whole lot into the pan and stir well.
4. Add the bay leaf, turmeric, black pepper, and cornflour. Stir to combine and cook for a couple of minutes.
5. Pour in enough stock to just cover the vegetables. Allow it to cook and reduce for 10–15 minutes.
6. Add the diced lamb, a dash of Worcestershire sauce, and the frozen peas and/or green beans. If any jars of dried herbs are nearly empty, tip them in now – and add the items to next week's shopping list.
7. Turn off the heat, cover, and leave to cool slightly.
8. Meanwhile, boil and mash the potatoes with butter, white pepper, and the grated cheese until smooth and generous.
9. Spoon the mash over the filling once it has cooled a little – this stops it from sinking. If you cannot wait, don't worry about it.
10. Bake in a preheated oven at 190°C / 170°C fan / Gas 5 for 25–30 minutes until the top is golden and the filling is bubbling at the edges.

Making the Most of a Roasted Leg

Shepherd's pie has always been a dish of necessity – a way of stretching a joint further than it had any right to go. The name itself tells you everything: shepherds kept sheep, sheep occasionally ended up in the pot, and nothing was wasted. That tradition sits comfortably with the way I cook at Casa Adora, where a leg of lamb on Sunday has a habit of reappearing mid-week in an entirely different form.

The key is the mash. Not a thin, apologetic layer scraped across the top, but a proper blanket – well-buttered, generously cheesed, and white-peppered into submission. The cheese is whatever is lurking in the fridge. Manchego works beautifully here in Andalucía. So does a sharp cheddar, a crumble of feta, or the last of a block of something unidentified but probably fine.

The Storecupboard Does the Heavy Lifting

This is where the leftover lamb shepherd's pie earns its keep as a genuinely economical dish. The flavour base – garlic, sun-dried tomatoes, a splash of wine, and stock from the previous day's cooking – costs almost nothing because it was already there. The turmeric adds a quiet warmth without announcing itself. The cornflour thickens without fuss.

If the dried herb jars are running low, now is the time to empty them. Thyme, rosemary, oregano – any of them belong here. The pie is accommodating in the way that all good leftover cooking should be.

A Note on Timing

Let the filling cool before adding the mash. It is a small discipline that makes a real difference – a hot filling causes the mash to sink and lose its texture. Ten minutes of patience is all it takes. Or, as I freely admit in the original recipe, you can ignore this entirely, and it will still taste fine.

This leftover lamb shepherd's pie recipe is part of the Lamb & Goat Hub — a collection of lamb and goat recipes from Casa Adora and the road. Explore the full collection.

Wonky photos, proper food, genuine adventures – The Flexible Chef.