How to cook the perfect fish pie, according to Richard Corrigan
Impress guests with this deceptively easy and delicious dinner party dish
Words: Zoe Dickens
We’re now entering week six of lockdown and chances are you got sick of your ‘world-famous’ spaghetti bolognese around batch eight or nine. If, like most of us, you’re used to cooking the same four or five dishes on rotation – and relying on Deliveroo in between – now’s the time to start expanding your culinary horizons. And where better to start than with a comforting classic like fish pie?
Award-winning chef Richard Corrigan has shared his favourite fish pie recipe with us. In fact, he thinks it’s so good he dishes it up at his Mayfair restaurant Bentley’s. To really impress your flatmates, we recommend you serve a few slices of Corrigan’s soda bread on the side – bon appetit!
Richard Corrigan’s Fish Pie, Serves 4
Ingredients, For filling:, 1kg fish fillets, including salmon, smoked haddock and white fish, such as pollack and haddock (the smoked haddock trimmings will be used in the sauce), 1. 1.5kg floury potatoes, 2 egg yolks
Sauce:, 100g butter, plus a little extra for sweating the vegetables, 1 onion, diced, 2 cloves garlic, crushed, Sprig of thyme, 150ml of white wine, Smoked haddock trimmings (see above), 2 pints milk, 100g plain flour, 1 tablespoon English mustard, Handful of chives and parsley chopped
To finish:, A little lemon juice, A handful of fresh breadcrumbs, A little grated parmesan
Method
- Remove the skin from the fish and cut into bite-sized pieces, reserving the skin of the smoked haddock for the sauce.
- To start the sauce, heat a little butter in a saucepan, add the onion, garlic and thyme and sweat until softened. Add the white wine and the smoked haddock trimmings and cook for a few minutes to burn off the alcohol. Add the milk and bring to just under the boil, then take the pan from the heat, pass the contents through a sieve into a bowl and keep hot.
- Melt the 100g butter in a heavy saucepan, add the flour and cook over a low heat, stirring for 5 minutes. Pour the hot infused milk into the pan and whisk vigorously until the mixture is smooth and thick. Taste to make sure you can’t taste the flour. If you can, let it cook gently for a little longer.
- Whisk in the mustard and add the chives and parsley. Check the seasoning and add salt and pepper and more mustard if you wish. Leave to cool down while you make the mash — it is best not to assemble the pie with hot sauce as it will cook the fish too quickly.
- Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas 4.
- Peel the potatoes and cook in boiling salted water until tender. Drain in a colander and allow the potatoes to steam for a couple of minutes to rid them of excess moisture, then mash and season with salt and pepper. Add the egg yolks.
- Scoop the mash into a piping bag — it needs to be hot in order to pipe easily.
- To assemble, spoon a little of the sauce into the bottom of a pie dish. Arrange a selection of fish on top of the sauce. Season with salt and pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice.
- Completely cover with sauce, then pipe or spoon on the mash. Mix together the breadcrumbs and parmesan and sprinkle over the top.
- Place the pie on a baking sheet and cook for around 20 minutes until the top is golden brown.
- Serve immediately.
Looking for more cooking inspiration? These are the kitchen skills every gentleman should know…
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