Shepherd's Pie Variations

LL Taco Filling Shepherd's Pie

There are a lot of ways to do Shepherd's Pie. This is a super-easy one for a potluck. You may have to show people how to fix it on their plates, but it's really a tasty one dish meal much like that SDA staple - the haystack.

There are a variety of vege-meats that work for this dish. You can even use plain textured vegetable protein if you season it up like vegeburger.  Ultimately the barbecue sauce give it the flavor. This dish is really three in one and has always been a King family favorite. You can even fix it up for people so they don't have to assemble it. It's up to you. I like to make mine from separate bowls of potatoes, vegeburger and mixed vegetables. Here's how it works.

Ingredients for Taco Filling version (without mashed potatoes ingredients)

 
Ingredients:

• Mashed potatoes - (See "Mama's Mashed Potatoes")
• Frozen or canned mixed vegetables
• Loma Linda Taco filling, Loma Linda Beefless Chunks, Loma Linda Redi-Burger, Morningstar Farms Recipe Crumbles, Worthington Vege-Burger
• Bulls-Eye or KC Masterpiece barbecue sauce.
• Tomato Sauce (for the Loma Linda Taco Filling version)

Directions:

1.  Make up a big pot of Mama's Mashed Potatoes or fix some up your favorite way.
2.  Heat up a big pot of mixed vegetables or put together your favorite mixed veggies (peas, carrots, corn, green beans, Lima beans, etc.).
3.  In a large skillet pour in your vegemeat straight out of the can or bag. If you use the LL Beefless Chunks, pour off some of the gravy.  Brown the vegeburger or chunks or crumbles till it looks well cooked.  With the Taco Filling version, add a little tomato sauce to take down the Mexican spices a little bit before you add the barbecue sauce and cook it in a little bit.)
4.  Pour barbecue sauce into the vegemeat to make a kind of barbecue gravy.
5.  Set the skillet out on the counter alongside the mashed potatoes and mixed veggies in this order - potatoes, barbecue vege-meat, and mixed veggies.
6.  If you'd rather make it as a single dish, do this.  In a large casserole or two or three if you make a lot, put a bunch (that's a technical term used by famous chefs) of mashed potatoes into the casserole to make a bed for the other ingredients. Then spoon a layer of barbecued vege-meat and a layer of mixed veggies.  Cover with foil and you can reheat it in the warmers at church as a single casserole dish.

The LL Beefless Chunks version of shepherd's pie.

This is a really tasty dish and one of those King Family favorites. It's in our cookbook.  This is another one that people will scrape the dish clean. The picture to the left is made with either Morningstar Farms Recipe Crumbles or NEAT burger or any other brand of vegeburger. The Recipe is in my Sept. 1, 2016 blog. I have forseen it!   ;-)

© 2015 by Tom King

King Hacienda Taco Enchilada Bake

I call this the King Hacienda Taco Enchilada Bake to differentiate from the King Ranch (no relation) dishes I’ve been posting.  So that you do not confuse this example of Tex-Mex cuisine with that developed on the famed South Texas Rancho Deluxe, let me specify that the King Hacienda is rather less imposing.  We are the other King Family enterprise which consists of a pair of Texas ex-pats living up here in liberal Washington State. It's a sumptuous 1 bedroom hacienda located over a garage deep in a South Puyallup cottonwood swamp, just an ash cloud’s throw from Mt. Rainier where Sheila lives with her husband, Tom and Daisy the Wonder Dog.

You may notice that my King labeled dishes tend to have a certain cheesy quality to them. If you object to cheese, you are certainly free to use grated tofu, grated soy cheese or anything else you can find that’s of a cheesy texture and which melts. It is my own belief that cows are quite proud of their cheddar products and don’t mind me using them to create Tex-Mex dream dishes for celebratory purposes.

The King Hacienda Taco Enchilada Bake is a lovely dish that I based on a Krysten Schwartz recipe on tastykitchen.com.  I simply vegetarianized it. The recipe doesn’t call for a lot of spices. I use Loma Linda Taco Filling which is already spiced up. The rest of the flavors come from the ingredients, which are as follows:

Ingredients:

• Small can or ½ large can of Loma Linda Taco Filling
• ½ large onion diced
• 2 cups grated cheddar cheese
• ½ cup sour cream
• ½ cup Picante sauce
• Small can tomatoes and green chiles (Rotel mild)
• 10 corn tortillas

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees
2. Carmelize diced onions in skillet then add taco filling and brown
3. In small bowl mix sour cream, tomatoes & green chiles and Picante sauce
4. Spray the bottom of a 9x12 casserole dish with spray cooking oil and add a few little dabs of Picante sauce.
5. Lay 3 or 4 corn tortillas over the bottom of the casserole dish
6. Add a layer of cooked onions and taco filling
7. Spoon in a layer of the sour cream/picante/chiles mix
8. Add a layer of grated cheddar
9. Add a second layer of tortillas. (Tortilla chips will work too, but will make the dish saltier)
10. Add the rest of the taco filling and onions
11. Add the rest of the sour cream/picante/chiles mix
12. Top with cheddar cheese and bake at 350 degrees until bubbly. If you are going to reheat it for potluck the next day, pull it out before it browns on top, then heat until the cheese starts to brown on top just before serving.

Note:  This is a great way to use up leftover vege-taco meet after a taco supper or something. I can also get two of these enchilada bakes out of a single large can of Loma Linda Taco Filling – a nice contribution to a big potluck. This dish is even better if you make it the day before. The flavors permeate through the dish and give you a lovely panoply of tastes in every bite.

Have a Happy Potluck!

Tom & Sheila King

© 2015

Southwestern Veggie Burgers

It's the avocados slices and cheddar and perhaps a little picante sauce
that give this vegeburger the "Southwestern" touch.

This was a fun sort of vegeburger recipe and turned out really tasty.  We had a giant can of Loma Linda Taco Filling and only used about half of it when we made tacos. Sooooo.....

I'm hungry for vegeburgers and fresh out of regular vegeburger, so I thought, "Why not come up with a Tex-Mex vegeburger.  I already know how to give regular vegeburgers a Tex-Mex flavor, but I wonder if Taco Filling will give it a little more bite?"

Here's what we came up with in the El Rancho de' King kitchen.

What You're Going to Need:

Can(s) of Loma Linda Taco Filling (or however much you have left from Taco Night)
Eggs
Flour
Oatmeal (optional for texture)
Chopped onions
Chopped jalapenos (optional)
Mono-unsaturated oil
Hamburger Buns  (# depends on size of group)
Lettuce
Tomatoes
Avocado
Pickles
Mayo/Salad Dressing
Ketchup
Picante sauce
Shredded Cheddar cheese or Cheese slices (if you want cheeseburgers - cheddar is best)

Directions:

1. Get out a big bowl and put all the Taco Filling in it. How many servings you get out of this recipe will depend on how much Taco filling you use and how big you make the patties. You don't need seasoning because the Taco filling is already seasoned. However, feel free to add a little cumin. I did. Gave it more of a Tex-Mex aura.
2. For every large can of Taco Filling, add a quarter cup oatmeal, a quarter to half of a chopped onion, two eggs (to hold the patties together), 2-4 tbsp of flour and however many finely chopped jalapenos your group can tolerate.  I go very light out of deference to the tender mouths in the group. You can put the rest in a bowl and set them with the condiments. Mix thoroughly.
3. Chop the lettuce, slice the tomatoes, slice some onions, slice the avocados. Set up a burger bar with a plate for the burgers, then put out buns, mayo, ketchup, picante sauce, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, onions, avocado and shredded cheddar/cheddar slices in that order for successful burger building.
4. Once the burger bar is set up start frying up the patties so they will be hot as everyone cues up. If your church has a big grill, you've got a perfect setup. I've used 4 large frying pans to keep up with the demand.  It works for a potluck or a burger sale for Pathfinders in the church gym. The hot vege-burger is what's important to making the burgers extra special. 

Note:  Let people know that these are Tex-Mex burgers so they won't think something is wrong with them. Also make sure the tender-mouths know that the bowl of little green bits isn't pickle relish, but jalapenos.  You might make a separate mix without jalapenos and set up a hot vs mild plate of burgers on the burger bar. 

Makes a nice change-up for burger night with your youth group and also is a great way to use up leftover Taco Filling around the house. This is also a fun thing for small church groups or socials.

Bone Appetite!

Tom King
(c) 2015

The South Of the Border Salad

This salad recipe is likely a variant of the venerable Adventist haystack. It was apparently invented by a restauranteur who owned a little cafe in an antique mall in downtown Cleburne, Texas, five miles from Keene, my hometown. Now Keene is an Adventist college town and notable SDA ghetto.  It is little wonder the basic haystack idea drifted into the Tex-Mex cuisine in the nearby Johnson County Seat.  They had a Pappa and Mama version, probably in deference to all the Adventist vegetarians that came into the place.  The Papa version used hamburger and was more expensive. The Mama salad used ranch-style or chili beans, but otherwise, both were basically the same

The South Of the Border Salad was advertised and listed on the menu by it's three primary initials. The South Of the Border Salad was named what it was named I figure, both for its Tex-Mex flavor and because it gave the local heathens a giggle whenever some very proper Adventist customer or little old Baptist lady, when ordering, would nervously point to the menu or describe the salad by its ingredients or call it a Mama Salad, rather than say the name listed on the menu.  It's an easy-to-make potluck dish and can be added to a haystack potluck setup by baking a bag of potatoes or two ahead of time.  It's versatile for a potluck because you just set out the ingredients and let everyone make their own version. Way better than pizza too!  This is pretty much a whole meal by itself, so while it's listed as a salad, it's a lot more than just an appetizer.

Ingredients:

• Baked Potato, Large

  

  Start off your South Of the Border Salad with a baked potato.

• Butter/margarine
• Salt
• Chopped lettuce
• Diced tomatoes
• Chopped salad veggies like peppers, onions, cucumber carrots or whatever you've got.
• 1/2 cup Avocado or make up a big bowl of guacamole
• Jar or two of Picante Sauce
• Shredded cheddar cheese (for potlucks just buy a big bag of it already shredded)
• Bit carton of sour cream
• Bottles of Ranch and Catalina Salad Dressing
• Black olives
• Pot of Ranch Style Beans or you can use Loma Linda Five-Bean Chili, Chili Man or barbecue beans of some kind.
• Loma Linda Vegeburger, Worthington Vegeburger or Morningstar Farms Grillers Recipe Crumbles (you can even brown up some Loma Linda Taco Filling)
• Tortilla chips and Fritos
• Chopped Jalepenos
• Monster jar of Picante' Sauce (Pace or San Antonio Riverwalk is great)

Directions:

Add tortilla chips and beans or chili

1. Bake up a bag of potatoes in the skins before the event. You can take them already baked and heat them up in the church's warming ovens.  Most Adventist churches have these. By the time potluck is on, they should be nice and fluffy inside. 
2. Cook up a big pot of Ranch-Style beans or Vege-chile.  
3. Chop up your veggies, grate your cheese and set out the sour cream, tortilla chips and what not all out in a row in order of how you build your South Of the Border Salad.

Constructing the South Of the Border Salad: 

Next add all the salad stuff and voila!  You're done.

1. Break open the potato and spread it out over the bottom of the plate. You can leave the skin on or peel it off.  It's up to you, but I like all the vitamins to come with my potato.
2. Butter and salt is optional.
3. Add a layer of tortilla chips
4. Spoon on a layer of chili, barbecue or Ranch Style Beans
5. Make a a bed of lettuce and start adding all your chopped veggies. Get what you want. Make it with onions or without. There are no rules. 
6. Sprinkle a bunch of shredded Cheddar over the top.
7. Decorate the whole beautiful pile of stuff with dollops of avocado or guacamole, salad dressing, Picante sauce, olives, crouton, vege-bacon bits (TVP) and chives or whatever else you like.  Add a little peak of sour cream and you have created a magnificent meal - run for the table

This salad is best consumed quickly which is never a problem for me. That way, the salad stays cool and crisp while the potato and chili give you a nice warm base. It's great!  I've seen teenage boys consume two or three of these in a row. Sadly, this feat of gastronomy is no longer permitted me by either my physician or (more importantly), by my Sweet Baboo who does not wish me to explode and die.

Bon' appetite!*

(c) 2015 by Tom King

*And, yes I spelled it "appetite" on purpose - the American way not "appetit" like the French. This is, after all, an American Tex-Mex dish and we don't pronounce words all French and sissified.  Just sayin'.