Microwave Cottage Pie with Quorn Mince

This microwave cottage pie with Quorn mince will be on your plate in well under 10 minutes!  A perfect quick and easy meal for one, or the whole family.  I made mine to serve one, but it can easily be scaled up by simply microwaving it a little longer.

Having taken a look through the freezer, I’ve realised that I’ve got three large (500g) bags of Quorn to get through!  So, today, it was my standard Quick & Easy Cottage Pie made with Quorn mince for lunch!  No fuss, no extra points for presentation, simply a fast and tasty hot lunch in under 10 minutes!

Ingredients:

• 80grams frozen Quorn mince. You can use fresh Quorn too.
• 2 tablespoons of dried onions (or 1 tablespoon of onion powder)
• 2 teaspoons instant gravy granules (or 1-2 stock cubes)
• A splash of brown sauce, ketchup, or Worcestershire sauce (what’ve you got?) – this is optional
• 1/3rd cup of water
• 1/3rd tin of peas or tinned carrots (chop up small)
• Instant mashed potato & butter for the cottage pie topping.

Method:

1. Add the Quorn, dried onions, instant gravy granules, sauce and water into a microwave safe bowl or jug. I used my Microwave Noodle Bowl as I find these handy for microwave cooking.
2. Microwave for 2 minutes. Stir.
3. Microwave for 2 minutes
4. Add the peas (or carrots). I’ve used tinned peas, but you can use frozen peas if that’s what you’ve got.
5. Microwave for 1 minute.
6. Let it stand for 1-2 minutes.  Now’s a good time to be making up that instant mash!

Pour out into a dish and top with the instant mash, made up with a knob of butter!

Quorn mince topped with mashed potato, makes this a quick and easy Microwave Quorn Cottage Pie!

I usually just throw ingredients together, without any measuring, but I’ve now started to measure them, so I can add the ingredients here. On reflection there were a few too many peas in this 🙂

It was very tasty though. I topped the mince with instant mashed potato.  I ate just the cottage pie, but you could add a side serving of baked beans, or top it with cheese and grill it if you like.

Compared to a ready meal cottage pie for one from a supermarket, this was a lot tastier and filling. Far more satisfying – and cheaper.

This has also reduced my plastics waste – not that I’m all green and hippy or anything, but that’s one ready meal carton not sent to recycling.

Menu Cost:

Quorn £0.24, onions £0.01, instant gravy £0.01, peas £0.06, potato topping/butter £0.10.

Total ~£0.42.