The full range of things called 'pudding' in the USA

[Mangetout]

I think in the UK, casserole has not diverged so far - casserole expectations here are, I believe, a stew that has been baked or slow-cooked and is darkened by caramelisation,

The casserole-pan dish shown above would (I think) be called a ‘bake’ here (not very imaginative, I know), but I’m not sure we have anything like the range that appears in the US - ‘pasta bake’ is very common, but that’s about it, to the extent of my experience.

We have a load of other things that may or may not be technically casseroles - Lancashire
Hotpot, for example, which is a stew topped with sliced potatoes and baked.

[MrDibble]

No. I wouldn’t call it that, either - either a “lasagne pan” or just a “rectangular dish”.

That’s what Le Creuset calls it, too.

[Elmer_J.Fudd]

In California, we call the rectangular one (even Le Crueset) a casserole dish and a deep round or oval one a Dutch oven.

[Chronos]

I wouldn’t call a pan a Dutch oven unless it’s cast-iron. And probably also has a concave lid, on which coals can be piled. I might be in the minority on that, though.

[mbh]

Yeah. You either cook one type of food inside the pot while a second is cooking on top of the lid, or bury the whole thing in your campfire, and put coals on top of the lid.

[Thudlow_Boink]

@Chronos

I wouldn’t call a pan a Dutch oven unless it’s cast-iron. And probably also has a concave lid, on which coals can be piled.

That’s certainly what I think of as a Dutch oven.

Unless I’m thinking of the secondary meaning.

[Mangetout]

@puzzlegal

Also, in the US, shepherds pie can be made with any meat, and is usually beef unless otherwise specified. I’ve heard that in the UK it needs to be lamb, and it’s ‘cottage pie’ if it’s made with beef.)

It’s the same in the UK - Shepherd’s pie can be made with any meat - traditionally, it would be leftover trimmings from the Sunday roast, finely diced - but nowadays it’s normally made starting with raw minced meat.

There are pedants in the UK who try to enforce the nonexistent rule that it must be lamb if it is to be called ‘Shepherd’s Pie’, but they are wrong; this is not a rule and it is not true to the origins of the dish, and anyway, the definition of a shepherd is not ‘a person who eats sheep.’

[puzzlegal]

Lol. No. But one presumes that shepherds have access to sheep flesh, and might be more likely to eat it.

[pulykamell]

@Mangetout

There are pedants in the UK who try to enforce the nonexistent rule that it must be lamb if it is to be called ‘Shepherd’s Pie’, but they are wrong; this is not a rule and it is not true to the origins of the dish, and anyway, the definition of a shepherd is not ‘a person who eats sheep.’

Thank you. I did a deep dive on this years ago using Google Books and looking for the earliest Shepherd’s Pie recipes I could find and they pretty much all started with any meat from yesterday’s leftover roast. It was a way to repurpose leftovers to another dish. These days we typically start with raw (usually minced/ground) meat, as you noted.

[Mangetout]

That’s the connection people are assuming but it’s a tenuous one. The mention of shepherds in the name of the dish is an implication of frugality and poverty.

[Q.Q.Switcheroo]

See also:

Ploughman's lunch

[Mangetout]

I’m pleased to see the actual history of that one surfacing now - a few years back it seemed all you could find was the myth about it being invented by the Milk Marketing Board in the 70s