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Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb

Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb – If you’re looking for an easy healthy meal, you have to try our Shepard’s Pie with Lamb! Filled with veggies, meat, healthy fats, and whole grains, there are no sides required to make this meal complete! It’s also so tasty, the whole family will love it.

Ready to learn how to make this fail-proof dish from home? Keep reading for all of the details!

shepherd's pie with lamb

Shepherd’s Pie Recipe

Shepard’s Pie is not all that terrible for you in the first place. It does, however, have a couple of ingredients that we try to avoid on our clean eating diet. One of these is dairy from the butter, while the other is gluten from the wheat.

While we do not promote any particular diet here at Clean Cuisine (only clean eating), there still are some ingredients that are simply so pro-inflammatory for such a large amount of people (including ourselves), and unnecessary for a balanced diet, that we have cut them from our lifestyle. The benefit comes nowhere near to outweighing the risks!

So, what are the problems with gluten and dairy?

shepherd's pie with lamb

The Problem with Dairy

Getting in your daily dose of milk or cheese daily has been drilled into us as an essential part of a balanced diet nearly our entire lives. We’re often told that milk is essential for proper calcium and healthy strong bones, a great source of vitamin D, and offers a hefty dose of protein with each glass. 

While the potential benefits of dairy are are spread far and wide from those in food and nutrition-based lines of work, the negative side effects and risks are almost always hidden, and never get brought up. If you didn’t do your own research, you’d truly never have an idea that there could ever be an issue with dairy!

So what exactly are the problems with dairy? There are so many to name, that we actually wrote an entire article on it! As a brief overview, the problems with dairy are…

Dairy is Pro-Inflammatory

Not all inflammation is bad. Our body actually uses small amounts of inflammation to help us heal, and keep the body running optimally! The problem lies when we have an overload of chronic inflammation, often leading to autoimmune diseases, and other health struggles.

Milk is doing nothing but contributing to the inflammation epidemic we have in our world. The inflammation caused by dairy is because of the proteins in dairy (casein and whey), as well as the sugar (lactose). A large percentage of the population is lactose intolerant, as this enzyme usually greatly depletes after winging from nursing as an infant.

May Cause Leaky Gut

Leaky gut, or gut permeability, cause a slew of issues, and is unfortunately, all too prominent in our society. Leaky gut can have a multitude of root causes, but dairy is a huge contributor! This has to do with the protease inhibitors that are in dairy. Protease inhibitors keep protein from breaking down, which puts our pancreas into overdrive to send out more digestive enzymes in order to help break those proteins down. Because we don’t normally have all of the digestive enzymes to break the proteins and sugar in milk down in our adult bodies, this creates an imbalance of digestive enzymes, often leaving us with a quite harmful enzyme called trypsin. Dr. Sarah Ballantyne does a great job explaining all of this. She goes on to break down the issue with trypsin, saying that since in large amounts, trypsin can make the connection between enterocytes weaker, this can create a path for the contents of the gut to leak into the bloodstream. Therefore, creating leaky gut!

For the love of shepherd’s pie, we made a clean version of this popular dish! Think less meat, no dairy, and lots more veggies than the traditional Irish version, but ALL the flavor!

I could go on-an-on about the reasons dairy is simply not worth it (in my opinion). However, let’s go ahead and jump into gluten!

The Problem with Gluten

Going gluten free is not a fad, there’s actually a very good reason it’s so popular these days…because people notice a HUGE difference when they step away from it!

One of the biggest issues with gluten is that it’s just simply not what it use to be. So no, a huge surge in gluten intolerances didn’t just randomly happen for no good reason. Gluten has been so modified, treated with pesticides, and tampered with over the years, that it has become incredibly difficult to digest, and pro-inflammatory for a huge percentage of the population.

Just like dairy, gluten has been studied to cause inflammation and leaky gut for many people, and especially for those of us who are prone to, or have autoimmune disease!

Plus, with both gluten and dairy, there are so many delicious and readily available alternatives these days, there’s simply no need to continue putting your body through the stress these foods can cause!

Giving up gluten and dairy was a major game changer for my health, and are two foods groups I would never consider reintroducing.

shepherd's pie with lamb

Healthy Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb Recipe

We are not at all anti-meat, vegetarian, or vegan here at Clean Cuisine. In fact, we believe that well-sourced and properly raised meat can be a very important part of a healing diet! However, we definitely limit our meat, and would still consider ourselves to be “plant-based” or focused.

Our healthy Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb uses considerably less meat than traditional recipes and incorporates lots of extra veggies. When you start making the recipe, you’ll notice that the veggie to meat ratio is pretty much equal. But my version has so much flavor that I promise you won’t miss all that extra meat one bit!

By the way, classic Shepherd’s Pie uses lamb, not beef. But feel free to use pastured ground beef in place of the lamb if you wish. If you don’t do well with red meat, turkey is a great option as well!

shepherd's pie with lamb

More One Dish Recipes

Like mentioned above, our Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb Recipe includes all the healthy fats, meat, veggies, and grains to make this the perfect dinner, no sides needed! While these recipes may require more than one dish to throw together (unlike our “one dish wonders“), the recipes we’ll share next don’t require sides, or any other meal additions to make a nutritious meal.

Slow Cooker Chicken Recipe with Turmeric and Vegetables: This Slow Cooker Chicken Recipe with Turmeric and Vegetables is a set-it-and-forget-it tasty that yields incredibly moist chicken. 

Recipe for Turkey Casserole with Pumpkin Cream Sauce: This savory recipe for Turkey Casserole is made with penne pasta, sage and dairy-free pumpkin “cream” sauce. A perfect Thanksgiving leftover.

Vegetable Stir Fry Recipe: Who doesn’t love a great vegetable stir fry? Use the 10 tips above for how to make best vegetable stir fry recipe at home.

Burger Bowl: Here at Clean Cuisine, we love eating a plant-forward diet, and what better way to incorporate more plants than with a Burger Bowl?!

shepherd's pie with lamb

Ready to learn how to make this tasty recipe from home? Let’s get into the details!

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Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb

Filled with veggies, meat, healthy fats, and whole grains, this Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb is a complete meal! No sides required.

shepherd's pie with lamb
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  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 35 minutes
  • Total Time: 45 minutes
  • Yield: 9 1x

Ingredients

  • 2 pounds Yukon gold potatoes, rinsed and scrubbed
  • 1 pound organic grass-fed lamb
  • 1 medium leek stalk, sliced into small pieces
  • 1/2 cup Spanish onion, coarsely chopped
  • 1 1/2 cup frozen petite peas, thawed
  • 4 carrots, coarsely chopped
  • 1/4 cup raw cashews
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 1/3 cup dry white wine
  • 1 pastured organic egg yolk
  • 2 tablespoons measure-for-measure gluten free flour
  • 2 teaspoons gluten free Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 tablespoon tomato paste
  • 1 tablespoon minced garlic
  • 1 tablespoon fresh thyme
  • Unrefined sea salt and black pepper, to taste 
  • 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil, divided

Notes

  1. Begin by bringing a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the potatoes and boil for 15 minutes, or until fork tender. 
  2. Drain the potatoes, and place them back in the pot. Set aside.
  3. Place the cashews, water, and egg yolk in a high-speed blender, and process for 1 minute, or until smooth and creamy.
  4. Place potatoes, alongside cashew mixture in a large bowl. Use electric mixer to mash potatoes, and combine with cashew mixture into a smooth consistency. Season with salt to taste. Set aside.
  5. Place the leeks, carrots, and onions in a food processor to shred. Set aside.
  6. In a large skillet, heat enough extra virgin olive or avocado oil to cover the bottom of the pan with a thin layer.
  7. Add the leeks, onion, carrots, and garlic. Sauté for 4-5 minutes, or until veggies soften.
  8. Add the peas and thyme, and cook for 1 more minutes. 
  9. Add the ground lamb, and mash with a spatula, or Mix ‘N Chop. Stir in with veggies.
  10. Cook for 5-6 minutes, or until lamb is cooked through. 
  11. Add the gluten free flour to the lamb and veggies mixture, and stir to combine.
  12. In a separate small bowl, mix wine, Worchestershire, and tomato paste. Pour liquid mixture into lamb and veggie mix, and stir. Cook for 3-4 minutes.
  13. Preheat the oven on broil. 
  14. Spread the meat mixture evenly on the bottom of a  9 x 13-inch casserole dish. Spoon the potatoes over the meat, and smooth with the back of a spoon.
  15. Brush the potatoes lightly with oil. Broil 6-8 inches from the heat, for 3-6 minutes, or until potatoes are lightly browned (keeping a close eye to ensure the potatoes do not burn (this can happen very quickly). 
  16. Remove the pie from the oven, and allow to cool for 15 minutes or so before serving. Serve warm, and enjoy! 

© 2024 clean cuisine Recipe by:

Madison Suttles

Madison is passionate about health, fitness, and Jesus. She has lived with autoimmune symptoms nearly her entire life, but was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease in 2016. She shares her experience with Crohn's and living on a modified Specific Carbohydrate Diet as a resource to others on their health journeys.

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Kaneez

Tuesday 10th of February 2015

Hi,

What can I substitute for the winein the shepherds pie recipe?

Thanks

Ivy Larson

Tuesday 10th of February 2015

Hi Kaneez, Oh you can just use vegetable broth or bone broth, both would work just fine ;)

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