Shepherd's Pie - A Steve Rant

For audio click here. 

For any newcomers to the blog, Steve is a recurring character who likes to rant to his long-suffering friend Johnny about the little things in life. Here is an example. This is a very tongue-in-cheek rant based on the theme of this week's stories. 

“Have you seen this?” Steve said, and turned his phone around to show Johnny a blog post.

“No,” Johnny said. “What is it?”

“It’s a story,” Steve said, “called Shepherd’s Pie but it’s wrong.”

“Why?” asked Johnny, but he was pretty sure he was going to regret it.

“Well,” Steve assumed the pose and Johnny looked for an escape. “Listen to this line, I’d decided a shepherd’s pie would be a nice way to use up the mince. I was a bit bored of bolognaise, and lasagne was too fiddly; so a shepherd’s pie would be just perfect. See wrong.”

Johnny looked confused.

“Well, that suggests he was making a cottage pie not a shepherd’s pie,” Steve said, sitting back as if that was QED.

“What’s the difference?” Johnny asked.

“Don’t tell me you don’t know. Cottage pie is made of beef; shepherd’s pie is made of lamb. I thought everyone knew that.”

“Really I thought they were synonymous.”

“No you as well,” Steve rolled his eyes.

“Anyway how do you know he’s making cottage pie?” Johnny said.

“Well, who in their right mind would make bolognaise or lasagne with lamb mince? It is obviously beef mince he’s using, so he should be making cottage pie.”

“Oh I see,” said Johnny.

“The author, this Gareth what’s his face, has not fact checked.” Steve said.

Johnny really didn’t care. “Easy mistake to make I suppose.”

“Just lazy if you ask me.” Steve said finishing his drink. “Another one?” he asked, and wandered to the bar.

Johnny got his phone out and googled shepherd’s pie. He really hadn’t known it was meant to be made with lamb, and wasn’t sure his friend was right. He looked at Wikipedia and the Oxford Online Dictionary.

“What are you smiling at?” Steve said as he came back with two fresh pints.

“The term "shepherd's pie" did not appear until 1877, and since then it has been used synonymously with "cottage pie", regardless of whether the principal ingredient was beef or mutton.” Johnny read from the Wikipedia page.

“That’s bollocks that is. Everyone knows Wikipedia is made up.” Steve said.

“Well strange that the Oxford Dictionary doesn’t mention beef or lamb either isn’t it?” Johnny said with a smile, enjoying getting one over on Steve for once in his life.

If you enjoyed this, please check out my two novels.