Home Made Fish Chips PLUS More Fish Recipes by Jamie Oliver

So mealtimes can mean the family sitting nicely around the table or getting under my feet in the kitchen. And I love taking a classic takeaway but giving it a little twist so it's delicious but even easier to make at home. This could be a mistake to do this with the kids but uh let's go for it. Okay here we go. So fish and chips the nation's favourite dish. Do you like fish and chips? Okay so River didn't quite make the recipe. Buds do you want to help me? Yeah. Good lad. So look cooking battered fish at home with all that hot oil, kids running around, the smell, it's not that healthy. You know I just don't really like doing it at home so I've devised a way of getting that kind of fish and chips fix but instead of phoning up for takeaway, this is much healthier, much cheaper and a lot of fun to make actually. So we're going to do the most amazing smoky bacon crusted fish with oven roast potatoes, smashed peas and a few sort of seasonal veggies. It's going to be lovely right? So Buds you grab us a tray over there. I'll do the first potato. I've just washed about 800 grams of marish piper potatoes. These go nice and crispy. I'm going to half that potato like that and then put your hands either side as you know how to and go through like that. So that's what we want. Yeah nice wedges. So you happy to do that? Yeah. So I'll do two and you do two. Just put some olive oil into a lovely tray. What do I do after I've halved it? That's all right yeah just take it into halves. That's it, lovely. I'll put a little seasoning of salt and pepper and if you want to, you can kind of give it a little bit of a vibe with a herb. You could even have a little bit of spice and for an unknown reason River loves smoked paprika. So I'm going to put some actually on these chips. You get a sweetness, you get a very subtle heat. It's not really spicy hot but there's a smokiness. That's going to go in the oven at 220 degrees celsius for 40 minutes until golden and crispy. About halfway through I'll give it a nice little shake. Don't burn yourself. There you go, go and wash your hands. Now I've got four lovely fillets of cod. You could use any white fish, whatever is sustainable, whatever is local, whatever you love. So things like haddock, pollock, really really good. The question is how do you get beautiful crunchy fish that's perfectly cooked and flaky? But we can't batter, we can't deep fry because we're at home and I don't really want to do that. We're going to take breadcrumbs to the next level. So buddy if you can just crack an egg or two in there. There's a fork my friend. You're right bud, did you get a little bit of shell there? Yeah. Okay so have a little whip up. Can I hold it? Yeah of course. Angling it. It wouldn't be the same if there wasn't a little bit of mess. Now you can use white bread and it's very good but if you use a bit of stale decent bread right it's going to be amazing. And then I'm working like how can I get more, how can I get more? Buds go to the fridge mate, get one rasher of bacon. So I'm just going to slice, perfect yeah. So that's just a standard rasher of bacon. Just put that in a food processor. If you didn't want to use bacon you could have sun-dried tomatoes, you could maybe have herbs, rosemary particularly is good. You could use anchovies, stuff like that just to give it some funk, a bit of like attitude and seasoning. But also by drizzling in a little olive oil. This will put enough, did I just whack you? Go on. That is enough oil to get into that bread so that it protects the fish and gives you that crunch and you don't have to shallow fry, deep fry or any of that business. So it's a really brilliant little method. Is that enough? Yeah it's perfect. We don't need any salt because bread's pretty seasoned always. Have a look at this. So like smoky bacon, oil, bread, crust, all getting mixed up. Right turn it off. Other way, good lad. That's so cool. Just pour that in there. Smells really nice. Yeah, now we need a little bit of a production line. So it's good that I've got Buddy. So Buds, here my friend, if you use the same hand to do the flour, the eggs and the breadcrumbs by the time you get to the third one your hands are kind of breadcrumbs like the fish. So if you do flour with your left hand all over, just gently move it around. That's it. Yes. Pick it up with your left and just shake off the excess. Okay. Right now use right hand to mop it all over. Now I take a handful here and you lay it on those breadcrumbs there. Put that on both sides, apply a little bit of weight and there you have it. A lovely perfect breadcrumbed fish fillet with smoky bacon. I'll put it on an oil tray. Now what's brilliant about this breadcrumbing other than it being golden crunchy and a little bit smoky bacon like, is it will protect your fish to give you a lovely succulent flaky piece of fish. Go on my son, in you go. And it's at least half the fat of deep frying it, depending on what fish and chip shop you go to. So this is a really nice expression of fish and chips that's like way better for you. If you wanted to freeze this fish, you can if the fish hasn't been frozen already. Plus at £2.36 a portion by the way, it's really, really good value. So when the potatoes have had about 30 minutes, then I'll put the fish in at the same temperature 220 as the potatoes for 15 minutes. Both of them will come out golden crunchy and perfect at the same time. So let's have a little clean down. Yeah off you go buds. And then too many cooks. Buddy's gone to rally the troops. So fish, chips, mushy peas. Ah yeah and the old school mushy peas were that fantastic split dried green pea. I love it but we're not going there. Cooking for the family, I'm always trying to sneak more good stuff in them. So let's have fun with mushy veg. Frozen peas are genius. So about 500 grams goes in. And then really nice for an everyday green, frozen edamame. And they're a fantastic vegetable. Super healthy, you can get them in the supermarkets. So a little handful go in and then a little handful of broad beans. If it's that time of year and you've got other stuff, like I've got a bit of asparagus here, you know any other nice kind of spring greens you can get in there as well. So you can kind of have fun with mushy veg and make it as simple or as exciting as you like. Boil those for about four or five minutes and then I'm thinking okay tartar sauce, mayonnaise. My missus don't like it so I'm kind of going slightly down a different place. Smashed mint sauce. That with the chips and the greens, amazing. So I've got a nice bunch of mint, a little bit of salt. Bash up the mint until it's like a little mush. Kick it with a tablespoon of lovely vinegar. A little olive oil and then muddle it. And you'll get the most incredible, vivid green. Hallelujah! Tangy, seasoned, punchy mint flavour. That with a chip, amazing. That with your crunchy cod and even the peas, really nice. So one, two, three, four. Wait five minutes and let's feed the gang. So veg is done. Mash it to the consistency that you like. Just season it to taste and there you go. That amazing mushy veg, sweet and delicious. We've got our mint sauce and then I've got my chips here. Let's have a look at the fish. Yeah, I'll do a little portion. Vivid, smashed peas and other bits. Bosh! Then I'll go for our super tasty oven chips. And then fish. Just a little kiss of that minty vinegary sauce. That little bit of smoky paprika. Right, let's have a little try before I serve it up to the mob. Is it crunchy? You see how juicy that fish is and yet on the other side, the breadcrumbs and the bacon has gone so crispy. It's a really nice little technique. Wow! And the mushy veg is just full of life. I love it. Fish and chips is genius, isn't it? But before you phone up for a takeaway, this little take on it I think is really nice. Healthier, much cheaper and you did it yourself. Beautiful. Right, let's feed the troops. Yay, yay, yay, yay, buds. Thank you. Right, is the fish crunchy? Yes or no? Yes, I think. It's crunchy! Is it? Yeah. I like the mushy peas. I love fish and chips. Dad, this tooth's really wobbly. I don't know why because I ate it on a carrot the other day and it's just wobbly. Your tooth's wobbly? Yeah. Okay, so we've got pouting here. Have a little look at this. It's a beautiful fish. The same family as cod. There is absolutely no reason that every single fish and chip shop can go on to pouting. It's a brilliant thing. You can get it in fishmongers. You can get it in big, good supermarkets that have a fish counter. So let me show you how to cook pouting and fall in love with it like I have. So what I want to do first of all is hit it with a little bit of seasoning. Hit it with a little bit of flour, regular flour. Just one egg and that's going to allow whatever we put on top of it to stick. To the fish. The first time I tried pouting was this year. I'm, you know, and it's kind of unforgivable really. I'm into food. I'm into fish. But all chefs and the public, we've just never heard of these fish before. They've never been made famous. Do you know what I mean? And for me it's like a brand new band that's just come out of nowhere. Pouting for me in every single way is as good as cod. End of story. It's delicious. It's buttery. It's flaky. It's juicy. You know, it's a wonderful carrier of flavours. You can spice it. I'm just putting it in a little egg and then into some breadcrumbs. You know, I'm going to leave one hole, like a nice fillet, sort of adult style. And then also, you know, because a lot of us are cooking for kids and stuff all the time. I'm just going to cut one of these into three. Skin side down into a pan. Next time you go to buy your cod, ask for pouting. And if they haven't got it, ask them why. I think what you guys at home don't realise is that when you go and ask for something, the world starts to change. The temptation when you're cooking like this with any fish is to keep touching it, shaking it, turning it, prodding it. Use your instincts, right? You can see what's going on. If you look in here now, see there? You can see the frying taking place. Listen. You can hear if it's going too fast. It's frying nicely. What I want to do to go with it is some really nice sweet potato chips. Dead simple. Let me show you how simple it is. Just a couple of ingredients. Sweet potatoes. Give them a scrub. Delicious. A little bit different. Half it. Quarter it. And then just carefully put your fingers either side of the quarter and gently cut down like that. Make yourself a nice little wedgie. Sweet potatoes are sweet. They're nutty. And there's a few little tricks to make them gorgeous. So a little salt. A little pepper. You can put some herbs and garlic in there if you want. But for me, try this. This is smoked paprika. You can get it everywhere. And just like a little half teaspoon of this from a height. Just so it goes everywhere. It's brilliant. Little olive oil. And whack those in an oven at about 180 degrees Celsius, 350 Fahrenheit for about 35-40 minutes. You know when they're ready because they look gorgeous and when you eat one they taste good. They give them a toss up and what's nice is all that flavour sticks to the sweet potato. So I've got some in the oven going already. Let's show you how to turn this. Get it under there and just literally turn it over. Look at that. Absolutely gorgeous. You can see the whole texture of that. That is a first class formula one brilliant fish. I'm going to sort of like pimp up this beautiful fish by bashing up some basil. Bog standard mayonnaise going in there. It'll go a beautiful sort of pastel green colour. Lemon. Have a taste. We're in a good place. This is what those beautiful sweet potatoes look like when they're done. They're gorgeous. They sort of shrivel up, go crispy and really intensify. Let's plate up this beautiful, beautiful fish. And what's nice is you can see that gorgeous texture of the fish there. Just a couple of these little chips on the side. A nice little spoon of this gorgeous cheat's basil mayo. But it's brilliant. Really is brilliant with it. And there you go. A beautiful dinner. Let me just break into that. You can see literally how deliciously flaky and gorgeous that fish is. Go out, get yourself some pouting. Brilliant. Something that I want to share with you now is a beautiful version of a fish pie. It's thrifty and it's delicious and I call it sweet pea fish pie. It's so good. It's heroing most of the ingredients from over there. The freezer. Things like vegetables are amazing in the freezer. I'm using spinach and peas and then fish. You can have it sitting there in the freezer waiting for you to cook something delicious with it. And there's many methods of cooking, especially when it's in a nice sauce or it's kind of baked. Where frozen fish really can be fantastic. And as long as you get something nice and sustainable, you're laughing. So I have 300 grams of salmon and 300 grams of white fish. And if you look in the freezer aisles, you'll see some really good frozen fish. So in a pan we go and I'll cover that with 500 millilitres of milk. And I'll just simmer it to poach it until it flakes. So about 10 minutes. So this recipe is great at kind of swapping in different fish and making do and stretching fish a long way. Now what I want to do is show you how I make the most delicious mashed potato topping. I've got a kilo of potatoes that are peeled. Just cut into chunks. Boiling away for about 15 minutes. And then we're going to use the second freezer ingredient and that's 400 grams of frozen peas. Okay so just put them in there for a minute. Happy days. These can go back in the freezer. That's the great thing about the freezer isn't it? Just use what you need straight back in there. I'll drain it straight away. So over we go to the sink. So in this pan here we're going to make the most amazing cheesy sauce. Full of the good stuff. I've got two onions, finely chopped. And two carrots, finely chopped. Just in a little bit of olive oil. And I've let those slowly fry for like 10 minutes just to soften. So what I want to do now is to thicken the sauce. 60 grams of flour goes into that pan. And then mustard. Another store cupboard ingredient. I like a good teaspoon. It's not hot, you just get a nice flavour from it. Stir it in. And then the liquid that we need is going to come from there. The poaching liquor. So I'll just take a little spoon. Nick a little bit of that milk. Just steal a little bit of that liquid like that. And mix it around. So the fish has already flavoured the milk. Which is all going to add to the flavour of the whole dish. As it absorbs the milk, then we get the spoon and take a bit more. And it makes the most delicious sauce. You can see it thickening up. And it smells amazing already. The colour from the mustard is very, very good. And that last little bit of milk. Like that. You can see here, if I show you the fish. Can you see how lovely this salmon will just poach. Look. It's just falling apart. Really nice. Gorgeous. I absolutely love good quality frozen fish. It's handy. Can you see how lovely this sauce looks? It's really, really good. So the third frozen ingredient is frozen spinach. 100 grams go in. And again, frozen spinach is so brilliant to have in the freezer. It's particularly good for soups. In the stews for the last kind of half an hour. Really nice. Amazing in curries. And if you think about it. The amount of spinach in this bag would be like a pillowcase worth. Right, because it's all been blanched. And it's been squashed into these little kind of pellets. And if you just put it straight in a hot sauce like this. It starts to melt. And then you get spinach flavoured sauce. Which is going to be absolutely gorgeous. So look. The nice thing about this recipe is you can use whatever fish you can get your hands on. Fresh or frozen. But I just think frozen fish is brilliant if you use it in the right way. And in a dish like this. It's the perfect way. Now a little optional extra to give it real delicious flavour. Cheese. So a nice little grating of cheddar cheese. I think is really, really good. But literally use what you've got to hand. You can use it almost like a seasoning. So sort of 40, 50 grams. Look at that. So next up. Lemon juice. Just half a lemon going in there. I think it's delicious. So if you haven't got lemon that's fine. But just a little squeeze of lemon like that. Just lifts. Just lifts the whole story. I love it. So the sauce is now done. I'll have a little taste. Delicious. So good. A little salt. And a nice little hit of pepper. But good to check your seasoning. You can see here with the fish. We can just break it up into chunks like that. And we can just get that in. And of course if you had different fish. That's fine. You can duck and dive. And I think these times that's what it's about right. Being flexible. Being agile in your recipes. And you know you want to kind of be able to do good cooking no matter what. So look that looks incredible. Let's do the topping. Because I think this is one of the best bits. And actually as far as my kids are concerned right. It's all about the potatoes and the peas. So let's get a masher. Let's get a nice knob of butter. Pinch of salt and pepper. And then have a good old mash up. Just keep rattling away. And then we'll put it on top. I mean for me. For all the parents up and down the country. Always trying to get more veggies into their kids. You know this is a good way. But it's also blooming good for the adults too. So what I tend to do. Is just take a little bit of our topping. And lay it on the top like this. I don't throw it all on top. Because you don't want to displace all the lovely sauce. So sort of evenly distribute the potato here. Look here we go. That colour. It's just brilliant. And once you've done that. Just use the spoon. Just to sort of move it around. And sort of go up the edges. So you can make it rough and ready. You can fork it up. You can do nice little turns. Because as this cooks. It's going to go golden and blippy and bubbling. And that lovely sauce is going to find its way out. It's going to be extraordinary. And I can prove it to you. Because I did one earlier. Right check this out. Come on. Look, look at that. Crispy on the top. All the juices kind of baking their way out. Let's get that down. Let's have a little portion up. Come on. Oh look at that. Beautiful chunks of fish. Absolutely delicious. Really simple, good, honest grub. You know stuff that makes you really happy. Come on let's have a little try. So good. You would never know that was frozen fish. It's so good. It's a clever, delicious, thrifty dish. In the freezer. The peas, spinach and the fish. You know give it an hour or so. And you can have this. I'm going to give you a recipe that I think will put a little bit of love. And excitement and colour into your weekly cook. It's going to be a green rice dish. Light and fluffy. Full of flavour and the good stuff. Loads of spinach. And then we're going to cook fish. And I want to give you a principle that you can use in your life. In loads of different ways and you can get really creative. First up a principle of cooking the perfect fluffy rice. A lot of people in the 25 years I've been doing TV and cooking. Have really struggled with sticky rice. Overcooked rice. Rice that's not very nice. If you get a regular builder's mug here. Fill it with basmati rice. And this will be enough for four people. Then grab the same mug. I'm just going to do this to kind of get you to visually understand what I'm trying to teach you here. This method of cooking rice is what I call the absorption method. So what does that mean? It means that in the time that this rice takes to cook. It will absorb exactly twice its volume in water. And it will give you light fluffy rice. So this rice will go into our pan. I'm now going to teach you how to turn regular fluffy rice. Into something extraordinary and exciting. So I'm taking one bag that you get from the supermarket. 100 grams of washed spinach. Put that into a liquidiser. Spinach great. It could be swiss chard. It could be kale. Pick any greens that you love. It could be herbs. If you're in a real rush. It could just be like frozen peas and a bit of pesto. No use your fantasy. Anything green. I'm going to take a herb. I'm going to use coriander today. Steal a few just for garnish later. Whole bunch goes in. Whole bunch. Now it could be mint. It could be basil right. So use your fantasy. Then I'm going to take a whole bunch of spring onions. Take one for garnish later. Whole bunch just goes in right. It could not be easier. Then two cloves of garlic for that lovely perfume and gorgeousness right. So easy right. Really easy. You could do this midweek. No trouble at all. Then we're going to go in with our water. And we're going to simply liquidise it. No dramas at all. So lid goes on. Whizz it up. Beautiful colours. Easy right. We're going to go over to our rice. And we're going to boil this for five minutes okay. Hard and fast. Get that rice cooking. Season it with salt and pepper. And that's going to be beautiful. Give it a little stir. Look at that vivid green colour. It's telling you that it's good for you. Let's talk about fish. Cod or haddock to start off with. That's what's very common in Britain. But we should try and use some other fish. That is what I'd use for a portion. You can cut it in half. This is for four people this dish. All happening in one pan. You can have fun with it. I've got here some clams. Which is you know fairly affordable. You only need two or three. And they give off the most amazing stocks. You can throw in some prawns if you want right. We've got a bit of squid. You're going to cook something absolutely mind-blowing. But I want you to feel that you could do this for a dinner party. And really do something flash. So look it's green. It's bonkers. It's exciting and it's delicious. So we're about five minutes in. So I'll give it one last little stir. Can you see how the rice is beautifully absorbing. Look at that. Come on don't tell me that's not exciting. Now we go from high heat to a lower heat. I'm going to place. I've cut the fish so it's going to cook more in kind of harmony with the prawns. You don't want to have that cooked and that overcooked. We want a harmony right. So if you're ever worried you can just cut the fish in half a little bit. To let the fish in. So just use your common sense okay. Lay the fish in. Look at the colour. The rice being half cooked creates the perfect trivet for the fish. Kind of lay it out like a portion right. Because you're gonna and you can kind of snug it in there. Lay the prawn over the top. I put the clams right in to the rice. Why? Because they're going to release the most amazing stock. Delicious. The squid is delicate. I'm just going to pop that on top. The legs are less delicate so you can put them in the rice. And then all you have to do now is season. Tiny bit of pepper. And then just a kiss of olive oil. Now the lid goes on. We've turned it down. About seven minutes, no more. So to go with this. I love rice with yoghurt. I just don't know why it works really like the kind of comforting Moorish flavours with the tangy and the kind of fresh and the cold. Love it. So let me show you the easiest way to kind of bring to life standard yoghurt. I'm using a Greek yoghurt by the way. I'm going to have like four tablespoons of yoghurt there. Another little ingredient that I love is harissa. Fresh, cold, hot and fragrant. You take a little bit of this. Two teaspoons let's say. And I'm just going to ripple it. Look at that. And that will be a wicked thing. A little drizzle of olive oil. And that's just joyful. That lolloped on your plate. It's going to be amazing. So let's just talk finishing the dish. Like that's it. Minus the talking. That's the easiest prep. Lemons. Just cut them into little quarters. I've got some leaves of coriander here. Quite nice just to have that as a little sprinkle. And I saved that one spring onion again as a little sprinkle. So this is, look you can call it garnish. It's not, I mean it is a garnish. But I think for me garnish is also about you've got the cooked spring onions and coriander in that lovely green sauce. If you want to put a little bit of fresh chilli in as well. So this has had just under seven minutes. Okay. So the heat goes off. Come and have a look. It is going to be delicious. The rice is cooked. The fish is pearly white and gorgeous. I think that is a celebration of the sea. Now what I would do is sprinkle it with the spring onions. And that little bit of chilli. And a little bit of the coriander leaves. Just to tell the story but for texture as well. Go over with some lemon like this. Come on you know this makes sense right. So this all goes to the table. What a lovely thing. Imagine taking that to the table. I think this is a gift of a recipe. Maybe a tiny kiss of olive oil. So let's just plate up a portion. And then you can kind of bear me tasting it. And telling you like I know it's gonna be good. I'm gonna do it just for you. Because I'm a professional. Yoghurt and harissa. Okay so bearing in mind I haven't even put all of my portion in there. Look at that. That my friends is an exciting, easy, modern, contemporary plate of food. Right I'm gonna go rice first because I've got an urge. Now if that doesn't get you excited about fish. I don't know what will. Take care. In about half an hour I'm gonna feed my family some lovely homemade fish cakes. Crispy on the outside and golden. Flakes of beautiful smoked haddock in there. We're gonna start with the actual sauce. So I'm gonna put one white onion just roughly chopped up straight into that pan. And we'll start sweating that off just for about 10 minutes. Once you've softened off these onions I'm gonna use a little bit of flour. One heaped tablespoon. Mix that in to the onions. You can see the onions have taken on a little bit of colour. And then I'm gonna go in with 600 millilitres of lovely organic milk. So this will be the basis of your sauce. And not only that. That will become the place where you poach this beautiful side of smoked haddock. So this goes into that liquor. Skin side down and let that just poach away for five minutes. So here we've got a kilo of marish pipers just peeled. Boiled for like 12-13 minutes until they're tender. And then drain. Let it steam off. And that's really important because we want the potatoes to be dry. Then it's gonna hold on to the flakes of the fish. That's what you'll get from a good old marish piper. Just take a regular potato masher. You don't want it to be super smooth. And then make a little well in the middle. Crack one beautiful free-range egg. It holds the whole thing together. And just whisk that up like that. Take that lovely fish. Oh look how it's flaking. Over there like that. Now I'm just gonna take the skin and just ease it off. But look at the nice big chunks. Look at that. That's what it's all about. And then last but not least, a nice bunch of chives. You can use parsley. You can use basil. I personally think chives are really perfect in this because they're really mild. And then just fold it all up. It's all about keeping as much of the texture of the fish as possible. Look there's still big chunks of fish in there. So get that into eight little balls. Give or take. Let's wash my hands. So look, a little bit of moisture from your hands is going to help you make these lovely little patties. Now if you wanted to, you can roast these just like that. You can grill these under the grill. You can do these in a pan. Now let's make the sauce first. A nice bunch of chives straight in to this lovely milk. So what I want to do now is use the liquidizer. If I'm lucky I can pour that into here and not splash it everywhere. But that's always debatable. Let's put a few spoons in first. So let's whiz this up until nice and fine. Look at that. That is the most amazing colour. Wow. Get yourself a large non-stick pan. Get that warm. A nice lug of olive oil in there. Get your fish cakes. Let's place them in the pan. Be delicate with them. You don't want to break them up. Let the oil just move around the pan and keep them jiggling a little bit. Let's turn these around. Look at that golden sizzling colour. Wow. About four or five minutes on each side. It's just a thing of beauty. Get that lovely sauce back in a pan to reheat it. Garnish this with some chives. Let's plate one up. I'm gonna have a little cheeky taster. Take that nice big fat fish cake like that. I've got a little chive flower that I'll just sprinkle over the top. A kiss of olive oil. Wedge a lemon. And that is a beautiful homemade fish cake. Let's get amongst it. Let's have a squeeze up. Lemon juice. Bosh. Nick a bit of that sauce. Look at that. Come on. Oh man. Right, who's the greediest person in the family? Me!