Not the prettiest dish, but incredibly tasty!
Greetings…
Well, last week I promised you something special. I like to think this was indeed something special, but along with the recipe, I have a story…
Dave here from MY YEAR ON THE GRILL. As a cook, there are just a few times when you really feel all warm in side. May happen when your children ask for something you make over a night at the McDonald’s drive through… Or how about hosting a dinner party and guests ask for a recipe card… Or how about when your Mother-in-law fumbles a dish and you are asked to rise to the occasion and salvage her mistake!!!
If you follow my blog recently, you remember that last Thursday Jackie and I left my tropical paradise for a different paradise. I made a brief stop at Kansas City, pretty much just to smoke and grill some pork (@25 pounds of pork). But that was only for a day. After that we went to South Dakota for Jackie’s Mother’s 76th birthday celebration. I made a post of my travels with plenty of pictures you can see on my site… but I digress…
Here’s the Mother-in-law fumble story…
Marie’s (my sainted Mother-in-Law) family was going to have a pot-luck lunch as part of her birthday celebration. Maybe a dozen families, over 50 people and everyone was supposed to bring a dish. I had about 5 pounds of my pulled pork (see today’s post for those details) that I was going to contribute. Marie was going to make potato salad.
The morning of the fun, Marie was up at the crack of dawn, boiling potatoes. She got busy, and wasn’t watching the pot and overcooked her taters badly. It happens, bet it has happened to you. She had already signed up to bring tater salad. So, when I got up (at least an hour after the crack of dawn (blame jet lag), she was already off to the store to buy more potatoes.
Over coffee, Marie was very upset that she was going to waste 5 pounds of potatoes that were too mushy to make into salad. Jackie asked if there was something I could do. I suggested she make mashed potatoes and just say she meant to do that all along. Well, long story short, the night before, Marie made an honest little mistake, that became the butt of old and senile jokes for the evening, and while she took it all in good humor, she did not want to live through another day of good natured humor. Marie was going to make potato salad period.
So, what to do with the mushy potatoes. Jackie asked if there was something I could do. Aside from mashed, couldn’t think of anything. Certainly could not come up with a mashed potato salad.
But I did recall a recent post I did. Thank’s to a Girlichef recipe, I had made a shepherd’s pie. You know, that all in one dish, ground meat on the bottom, mashed potatoes on the top and Girlichef added creamed corn and peas to the mix… and then topped with cheese. Hers was a beautiful thing, and mine was a fair copy. But the sweet of the corn and the savory of the meat and taters really did mix well.
Long story short, I made Girlichef’s pie (with my pulled pork in place of ground beef), rescued Marie’s ruined taters, and I nervously waited to see if anyone would eat it…
But first, here’s what I did…
I made a layer of pulled pork. I did dice up the pork into smaller sized pieces. i added an onion and 2 cans of cream corn (the recipe was being doubled). The pork was plenty seasoned, so no additional seasonings was needed…
And now, here’s what I did to make the taters better. They were pretty “shreddy (is that a word???) if you blew on em, they would disintegrate. SO, I added …
8 ounces of Cream Cheese
1 stick of butter
and milk as needed…
whip
The potatoes came out perfect!!! To the ooohs and aaahs of my Mother-in-Law (she was stunned by the cream cheese, which really helped to re-bind the taters together). Top the meat/corn mix with the whipped potatoes.
Top with some shredded cheese. I had a cup of peas set aside for people who wanted to add something extra…
Bake to warm up at 350 for about 45 minutes…
And everyone won. I told everyone Marie helped me (once I saw that the dish was well received), so her reputation was salvaged, and no old and senile jokes were made. I got a new use for left overs, so I can justify making extra pork shoulder next time I fire up my smoker. And my reputation as a cook in my wife’s eye makes her glow inside (remember, my only justification for her taking me to St Thomas is as her personal cook, and sometimes cabana boy).
And the measure of success in making a pot luck dish is how much is left. As I said, I made a double batch to use all of the potatoes. Well over half was eaten. Several people went back for seconds (the guys really loved it, and being in hunting territory, the idea of making this with venison was being talked about.
A big hit indeed. And please, check out Girlichef’s recipe for shepherd’s pie. You make it with hamburger, and it is VERY VERY GOOD!
Dave here from MY YEAR ON THE GRILL. It really is just this easy! … I CAN COOK THAT!
And so can you!
Dave saves the day and it sounds wonderful! 🙂
Very delicious for sure.
Great recipe ♥
Awesome save all around. Doesn’t pulled pork go with everything? I certainly think so! Happy birthday Marie!
Great story and nice “save”. I would eat pulled pork in anything. I have used pork instead of chicken in recipes, now we know we can use it instaed of beef! Good job!
Ha! You are so clever 😉 Honestly, I think this looks awesome…pulled pork and mashers all in one delicious bite…oh yeah!! I may just have to make my next Sheperds pie your way! Thanks for the props, Dave!!
Who says that this pulled pork shepard’s pie does not look good? This looks wonderful. It looks satisfying and comforting.
This looks great!! It doesn’t have to LOOK pretty to taste awesome and I’ll bet it did taste awesome!
Hey! Here’s a recipe for your hunting buddies–I made my first “shepherd’s pie” with ELK in January! And basically made it up as I went. Delicious! I bet the pork was good too. (Although there was some debate about using the name “shepherd” on a pie with wild game…same case with pork I think).
Here’s my recipe!
P.S. I LOVE cream cheese in mashed potatoes.