My version of cottage pie

As the title of this post says, this is not the traditional British cottage pie, but a version I made because I didn't have some of the ingredients ^.^U Basically, I replaced the beef stock with tomato sauce and added a leave of laurel and some pimetón (spanish paprika). Anyways, the result is delicious so I'll be sticking to this recipe in the future.

I decided to try this traditional British dish when I was trying to decide what could I make with a package of ground beef, if meatballs or a hamburger. Then it hit me that I hadn't baked anything in a long time due to the lack of appropiate equipment, but a cottage pie only requires an ovenproof recipent (which I had bought that very same day). By the way, I don't have an electric mixer yet and I didn't have a whisk or a mixing bowl till last week because my boyfriend and I have moved to another apartment -_-U In the other we could use the owner's tools but this one comes with just the very minimum furniture which means no plates, no glasses and, of course, no mixing bowls.

Ingredients:

450g minced beef
1/2 big onion
1 big carrot
50g peas
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove of garlic
400g tomato sauce
4 big potatoes
4 tablespoons whole milk
2 tablespoons grated cheese (I used mozzarella)
10g butter
1 leave of laurel
salt, black pepper and pimentón

Method:

1. Add one tablespoon of oil to a saucepan anf fry sighly the beef, just until its brown. Take the meat out of the saucepan and reserve.
2. Mince the vegetables. Add two tablespoons of oil to the saucepan (don't take out the sauce left when cooking the meat) and fry the onion, garlic, carrot and peas. When the onion begins to cook add the tomato sauce, laurel leave, the reserved beef and salt and pimentón to your preference (be careful with the salt). Cook until the sauce reduces.
3. Meanwhile boil the potatoes until they're soft. Take them out of the water and let them cool sightly before peeling them.
4. Mash the potatoes and mix them with the cheese, butter, milk, salt and black pepper.
5. Preheat the oven to 180ºC. In an ovenproof dish put the beef and then spread the potato mash over it.
6. Bake for 20 minutes or until the potato mash begins to brown. Take the cottage pie out of the oven and serve immediatly.