Hachis Parmentier

Just out of the oven, made in one of those big paté dishes that
the charcutiers give away once the contents have been sold.

Hachis parmentier is a French family favourite, the equivalent of the anglophone Shepherds Pie. The main differences are that there are often multiples of both the mashed potato and the meat layers. In my version I've made a savoury mince filled mashed potato sandwich, with top and bottom being thick layers of mash, with a thin layer of meat in between. And that's another difference with hachis parmentier - the proportion of meat to potato is often that the potato is far more substantial than the meat. My version uses 1.5 kg of potatoes and only 500 g of meat (with lots of diced and puréed vegetables added) and serves 6.

A healthy dollop of classic comfort food,
and more for the freezer.

Apparently hachis parmentier entered the French culinary lexicon in the 18th century, and is named in honour of Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, who championed the use of potatoes as cheap, nutritious and filling back in the days when they were still considered unsafe for human consumption in France. Like Shepherds Pie, it is traditionally made from leftover meat (usually a beef stew in the case of parmentier). Any leftover vegetables and gravy are gladly added for colour and flavour. These days it's probably more often made from scratch with purchased raw minced meat. This is certainly what I did, using chair à farcir (pork mince, literally 'flesh for stuffing').