Recipes · Week Night Winners

Farmer Pie

Ingredients

  • 1 onion diced
  • 1 large carrot sliced into half moons
  • 1 cup frozen peas
  • 1 cup diced mushrooms
  • 1 veg stock cube (My fav are Knorr or Sainsburys)
  • 1 tin baked beans
  • 1 tin chopped tomatoes
  • 2 tbsp tomato ketchup
  • 1 tbsp brown sauce
  • Vegan soya mince (Our favourite is Sainsburys)
  • 6 large potatoes

Method

  • Heat oven to gas mark 5/ 180c
  • Boil the potatoes in one pan.
  • Heat your oil in another pan and soften the onions and carrots for 5 minutes.
  • Add in the peas, mushrooms and mince.
  • Add in the rest of the ingredients and stir.
  • Simmer the mix for 20 minutes, if it looks to dry out then add a little more liquid and stir occasionally.
  • Once the potatoes have cooked, drain and mash them.
  • Pour the mince mix into a pie dish and top with the mash.
  • Pop the pie into the oven for 15 minutes or until the mash is a little crispy.

Tips and cheats

You can really play with this dish. If you don’t like soya mince you can use 2 cups of red lentils and a handful of oats or you can make mushroom mince by blending 300g of mushrooms. You can add a little more brown sauce, I like the tang it gives the dish. feel free to add in two sweet potatoes to the mash and we often sprinkle vegan cheese onto the top before it goes in to the oven.

If you want to make this in advance you can do the whole things and pop it in the fridge and just cook in the oven when you want to eat it. You can also freeze the mince mix although if you are using lentils they don’t defrost great.

Recipes · Week Night Winners

Vegan Chicken Pie

Moreish Vegan ‘Chicken’ Pie

Ingredients

  • 1 large leek sliced in to half moons
  • 2 large carrots sliced in to half moons
  • 150g sliced mushrooms
  • 1 cup frozen peas
  • 1 pack of vegan chicken pieces
  • 500 ml Bisto gravy (yup its vegan! as are some own brands)
  • 1 pack filo pastry
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Method

Heat the oven to gas mark 5/180c

  • Gently heat some oil of your choice in a large pan.
  • Add in all the veg and saute for 5 minutes.
  • Add in the vegan chicken pieces and just the 500 ml of water (not the granules!)
  • Bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes.
  • Stir in the gravy granules.
  • Pour the whole mix in to a pie dish, deep tin – what ever your pie will be in!
  • Take the pack of filo and cut the sheets in to 1/4
  • Take small bits and scrunch it all over the top of the pie.
  • Pop in the oven for about 20 minutes or until the pastry is cooked.
  • Serve! We like it with roast potatoes and more veg, either green beans or broccoli.

Tips and cheats

If you want to make this in advance don’t put the pastry on until you pop it in the oven. The mix will keep in the fridge for a day before cooking in the oven. You can also freeze it at this point.

If you don’t like filo pastry or want a luxury rich finish then use puff or shortcrust pastry. Again most of the shop bought ones are vegan (just avoid the all butter version!)

If you like a creamy sauce swap the gravy for 500 ml of veg stock and a dash of vegan cream. My current favourite is the Elmlea Plant based. – don’t add it straight in to the pan. Pour the cream in to a dish and add table spoons of the hot liquid in to the cream until it doubles in quantity then add to the dish. This helps to stop it splitting.

Blog Posts

Welcome

The Little Red Pinny

Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

Welcome to the Little Red Pinny! Since I studied cooking at school I have been sharing recipes and and cooking for others. I get so much pleasure out of cooking and enjoying food that I decided it was time to share some of my ideas and some of our favourite family recipes. As a full time working mum of two young children there isn’t always time to cook a three hour dish! You will find most of my week night staples can be cooked in a short amount of time and all of my dishes involve basic kitchen items so you wont need any fancy equipment! The other thing about my recipes is that you won’t have to scroll through a story as to why I have cooked it! Just a quick easy to follow guide! I might throw in some tips as to how you can spice it up or make it suitable for an allergy or two but I won’t give you a life story about a mushroom soup or bread roll!

Enjoy browsing! I will put up the odd blog post about this and that along the way but the recipes will be simple. Just good, honest, delicious vegan food that the whole family can enjoy.