This satisfying cottage pie will keep you warm this February proving that healthy food doesn’t have to mean that you only eat salads. The twist to this cottage pie is that it doesn’t use starchy potatoes in keeping with the Paleo diet – Paleolithic  – caveman – living in a cottage – geddit?

For healthy skin and weight we need to reduce our intake of starchy vegetables because the carbohydrates in starch (amylopectin and amylose) are actually long strings of sugar molecules. Your body does not respond well to a diet high in sugar as it leads to excessive levels of oxidative stress, glycation, low level inflammation, in addition to hormone and genetic instability. None of this is good for our skin, overall health or weight, so let’s leave the potatoes this time but keep it tasty with some real dripping.

Don’t be frightened of the dripping or lard. Remember lard is one of the few foods with high levels of Vitamin D and high levels of monounsaturated fat.

Recipe

1. Preheat the oven to 220°C.
2. Take a large pan and melt half the dripping in it.
3. Fry the onions and carrots until slightly softened adding the courgettes, mushrooms, celery and garlic afterwards.
4. Once the vegetables have all begun to cook through add the mince to the pan cooking until it has all browned off.
5. Add Worchester sauce, Italian seasoning, chopped tomatoes, bay leaf and ground pepper.
6. Mix through leaving to cook for 10 minutes.
7. Whilst the meat and vegetables are cooking scrub the Jerusalem artichokes clean with a kitchen-scouring pad. Once cleaned grate the artichokes along with the celeriac.
8. Melt the remaining dripping and mix into the grated artichokes and celeriac. Allowing the melted dripping to cool slightly add the egg whites and mix thoroughly.
9. Take a large baking dish add the meat and vegetables to the dish, layering the grated artichoke and celeriac on top.
10. Cook in the oven for 25 minutes until the topping begins to brown.
11. Garnish with the chopped parsley.