Homemade fish pie

Delicious, and easy, this fish pie is real food that anyone can make. Its made even more convenient by using a frozen fish pie mix from the supermarket!

You’ll need (serves 2 with leftovers) –

• 600g potato
• 400g fish pie mix (I used one from Tesco, all supermarkets sell them)
• 200g frozen peas
• 160g mature cheddar cheese
• 80g butter
• 1 tsp salt
• 200ml milk (or cream, or add in some cream fraiche)
• olive oil for greasing

First, you need to make mash! Food blogger confession – I tried to make mash once when I was a student, it went badly and since then I just assumed I couldn’t make mash (not sure why it never occured to me to try again). I actually contemplated buying ready made mash for this recipe but decided to brave it and it went great!

First, wash and peel your potatos and then cut them into chunks. They should be roughly equal in size so that they cook in the same time. Bring a large pan of salted water to the bowl and drop the chunks in. Simmer away for around 15-20 minutes. Test the potato chunks periodically by sticking with a knife. If the knife goes through easily and doesn’t get stuck, they’re done!

Once the potatos are cooked, drain them thoroughly and leave to rest back in their dry warm saucepan for a moment. Then add 30g butter and 30ml milk/double cream and mash away. Season with salt and pepper and yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuum! I was so happy that I made mash – tasted just like my mums!

Now for the rest of the fish pie (for maximum efficiency, you should be doing this while the mash is cooking). First, pre heat your oven to 180 degrees/ gas mark 4 and then tumble your fish pie mix into a greased ovenproof dish. I used a white enamel casserole type dish. Cover with the milk. Put the mix into the oven for 30 minutes and after that time, turn the oven up to 220 degrees / gas mark 7.

Grate the cheese and mix the peas with your mashed potato. Spread the pea potato mix overyour fish pie base and then spread the cheese over the top. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes.

Needless to say there are many great variations on how to make a fish pie – this Jamie version sounds fab – I think I’ll try this one next!

Yum! Enjoy!