Shepard's Pie ‒ Paimenpiiras

For dinner, I tried to make a Shepard's Pie according to this recipe. (Still don't understand why every other vegan recipe name has to refer to carcasses in one way or another. This week I even saw vegetarian roe being sold.) It's not really a pie but almost like one of the many Finnish casseroles, except that the layers aren't mixed together.

Didn't stick to that recipe too obediently, and didn't get anything like the things in those pictures either. More than a pie, it reminded me of a casserole. First of all, I replaced most of the vegetables with one cup of textured soy protein crumbles (after all, the original versions contain leftover meat, not vegetables), frozen spinach and sun dried tomatoes. Instead of cornstarch (which I've never heard anyone using in Finland) I used some potato starch as thickener, apparently not enough though. Oh, and I was out of nutritional yeast (oluthiiva), but that shouldn't make much difference. I didn't have enough mashed potatoes to cover the whole thing. Also, the thing was in the oven (200°C) over half an hour before it even started to brown.

Nevertheless, it's the taste that counts and in this case it was excellent. Next time I'll just try it with more solid vegetables, more potato starch and more potatoes. I'll post the recipe after I've made it work myself.