Fish pie with a sweet potato topping

I'm back on Jo Pratt again. I can't help it. I saw the fish pie with sweet potato topping and it struck me as an ideal weeknight dinner; it was a bonus that I had most of the ingredients in the house, even if the fish and seafood were in the freezer. Any pie made with mashed potato has to be high on the comfort food charts, but sometimes fish pie can take a bit of time to make. This version is quicker, mainly because the topping is grated raw potato, rather than cooked and mashed potato. This is the first dish I've tried from the 'Comfort Food' section of 'In the Mood for Food' - other recipes include a decadent baked breakfast baguette, cauliflower cheese soup and baked orange and lemon curd pudding. All wintery sorts of food - why is it we all need more comforting in the colder months? - and all reassuringly filling, yet also with a bit of a twist, which helps.

This recipe was a dream to make: cook some spring onions in melted butter until soft; add flour, stir, then add milk; simmer briefly; add pieces of white fish, smoked salmon and cooked tiger prawns with dill or parsley (chopped), lemon zest and a squeeze of lemon; season. When the fish is flaking, remove from the heat and spoon into a pie dish.
For the topping, coarsely grate either sweet potato or white potato (or, as I did, a mixture), and squeeze out the excess water. Melt butter in a pan, add the potato and toss it around in the butter for a couple of minutes. Scatter it over the pie and then top with grated mature Cheddar. Bake.


This was really good - I know it's a quick version of a fish pie but you would never know. I loved the topping - really different and very tasty. The absence of spinach, eggs, etc, inside the pie didn't seem to matter. It slid down really easily and reassuringly. I'll definitely make this again.