Fish pie to rival Jamie Oliver's

We cooked a version of fish pie as a treat for our daughter today and I dare say that it was as good as any that Jamie Oliver may have baked himself. Perhaps even rivalling the one we ate last September at the National Gallery restaurant in London too.  

The fish that we used was the Ang Choe. This is the common name for the fish in Penang Hokkien. In English, I think it is called the Golden Snapper. The Malay name is Ikan Jenahak. More information on the fish here.

Anyway, 400 grams of the Ang Choe went into the 10-inch dish. The fishmonger was requested to filet the meat and at home, I then cut up the flesh into huge chunks for the pot.

The other main preparation was one kilogram of finely mashed potatoes that would cover up the pie. Other ingredients that went into the pie were 500 grams of blanched spinach, half a can of thinly sliced button mushroom, two stalks of blanched sliced celery, green peas and two hard-boiled eggs.

The roux was made from the fish stock, flour, butter and evaporated milk. I know that this is all very rich but it did make a difference to the dish. The pie was completed with a generous layer of the mashed potatoes and then then baked to perfection for 45 minutes at 200 Celsius.

My daughter enjoyed it. First time that she had experienced fish pie, our version of the traditional English fish pie, learnt from a Hainanese friend whose grandfather used to own the Springtide restaurant in Tanjong Bungah almost eons ago. Here, you can see the bits of the baked potato crust, peas, spinach and fish all drenched in the rich gravy.














golden