Pâté Chinois
Pâté Chinois is a typical Québec recipe. Although the direct translation of Pâté Chinois is Chinese pie this recipe is neither Chinese nor is it a pie. This recipe is fairly close to what the rest of Canada would call a Shepard’s pie but it’s not the same at all (Jeff says it is, I think English Canada Shepard’s pie is gross). The internet says it was named after the Chinese railway workers who would prepare it in the late 19th century! This dish is firmly ingrained in Québec’s culture and you don’t mess with the three ingredients: ground beef, corn and potatoes! A little bit of Québec trivia, when I was extremely young, there was this show on TV called La Petite Vie. It ran for 6 years and it made no sense, it was just the simple life of this weird family, the mom was actually played by a male actor dressed up as a women and the parents slept in an upright bed. One of the show’s recurring joke was that the daughter in law could never remember the recipe for Pâté Chinois and how to assemble it so the mom would always repeat: STEAK-BLÉ D’INDE-PATATE (french for ground beef-corn-potatoes). Here’s a picture of the cast in character just in case you are curious (source: http://www.lapresse.ca/arts/television/200912/19/01-932642-la-petite-vie-en-telerealite.php)!
All this to say: Pâté Chinois is very tasty and extremely easy to do! Being a student, December is always super busy with final projects being due, exam period and getting ready for the holidays. I whipped up a batch of Pâté Chinois a few weekends in less than 45 minutes and had loads of leftover for the week!
- 6
- 10 minutes
- 30 minutes
Ingredients
- 1/4 large sweet onion (~1/3 cup)
- 600-700 g lean or extra lean ground beef
- 6 potatoes
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1 tbsp butter
- 341 ml can corn niblets
- 284 ml can creamed corn
- Olive oil
- Salt + Pepper
Directions
- Preheat to oven to 400 F.
- Chop the onions.
- Heat olive oil in a pan over medium heat, cook the onions for 4-5 minutes until translucent.
- Add ground beef, season with salt and pepper, break up the beef with the back of a wooden spoon and cook until the ground beef is cooked through.
- Transfer the cooked ground beef to a strainer placed on top of a bowl and strain the excess fat.
- Peal the potatoes and roughly chop them in 4 (this will accelerate the cooking time).
- Put the potatoes in a pot and cover with water, bring to a boil and cook for ~10 minutes or until the potatoes are fork tender.
- Drain the potatoes, add the milk, butter and, salt.
- Mash the potatoes using a fork, a hand-held or stand mixer.
- Mix the cream corn and corn niblets together.
- Assemble the Pâté Chinois in a large baking dish: steak, corn, potatoes.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes until cripsy on top.
More delicious recipes
This is one of the many fantastic recipes available on this blog