For those of you that eat a traditional shepherds pie you may not like my version, in fact you may think it’s crazy or even sacrilegious! But just bear with me for a moment, because this is really, really good! I promise.

I have mentioned before that when my husband and I met 17+ years ago, I could not cook at all. I could make white gravy, eggs and almost anything that came out of a box, but even that was sketchy. I was pathetic really, when I think about it. I had been given a few recipe cards with some of the things that my husband liked and was used to eating, so I really tried hard to learn to cook. This was one thing that was super easy and hard to screw up, so I was pretty successful at it. Over the years I gradually changed a few things and kind of made it my own recipe.

You could easily leave out the pepperoni, but it really does add a great extra flavor to the dish. I like the Parmesan and Romano flavors of cheese in this, but you could easily experiment with other flavor combinations if you wanted to. Sometimes I add in about a cup of chopped onion when I cook the ground beef. It’s totally optional.

Shepherds Pie

• 5 cups prepared mashed potatoes (I prefer Yukon Gold)
• 1 – 1 1/2 pounds ground beef, browned
• about 30 pieces of sliced pepperoni
• grated Parmesan/Romano cheese (the kind in the plastic shaker)
• fresh grated Parmesan/Romano cheese
• 2 cups green beans
• 2 cups corn

When I brown my ground beef, I add in salt, pepper and some of the shaker Parmesan cheese. Just cook it until it’s done and drain it if necessary.

On the bottom of 9×13 baking dish sprinkle grated parmesan cheese, the shaker kind, evenly. To that add a single layer of pepperoni covering bottom of dish.

Add ground beef to the top of the pepperoni and sprinkle a little more grated Parmesan.

Top that with green beans and corn.

Then spread your mashed potatoes evenly over the top of other ingredients. Top with shredded Parmesan. Sometimes if I am feeling a little on the wild side I will add a few little pats of butter over the top.

Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.