Fish pie

Fish pie

Type	Savoury pie
Place of origin	Britain
Main ingredients	White fish, cheddar sauce, prawns, hard-boiled eggs
Media: Fish pie

Fish pie, also known as fisherman's pie, is a traditional British dish.

According to Cook's Illustrated, the dish was likely created to make use of fish scraps during Lent.¹ John Murrell's 1615 A New Booke of Cookerie contained recipes for eel and carp pies that called for scraps.¹ Jessup Whitehead's 1889 The Steward’s Handbook and Guide to Party Catering instructs the cook to poach the fish, then drain it and cover it in cream before baking.¹

The pie is usually made with fresh and smoked fish (for example, cod, haddock, salmon or halibut) or seafood in a white sauce¹ or cheddar cheese sauce made using the milk the fish was poached in. Hard-boiled eggs are a common additional ingredient. Parsley or chives are sometimes added to the sauce. It is oven-baked in a deep dish but is not usually made with the shortcrust or puff pastry shell that is associated with most savoury pies (e.g. steak and kidney pie).¹

In place of pastry enclosing the pie, a topping of mashed potatoes¹ (sometimes with cheese or vegetables such as onions and leeks added)² is used to cover the fish during baking. The dish is sometimes referred to as "fisherman's pie" because the mashed potato topping is similar to that used for shepherd's pie.¹

Gifts of fish pie to the king were a common tradition for various occasions. In a Lenten tradition, the town of Yarmouth was required to bake 100 herrings into two dozen pies and send them to the king.³⁴ The prior of Llanthony, Gloucester, baked eels and carp into a pie as a gift to Henry VIII in 1530.⁴ In 1752 one was sent to the Prince of Wales. The tradition was also recorded during the reign of Queen Victoria.⁴

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  The stargazy pie is a traditional Cornish pie made with the heads of pilchards protruding through the crust.
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  Fish pies are also popular in parts of Russia.
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  Fish pie with sweet potato topping