It’s been nearly 11 years since I started this food blog and here I am publishing Jamie Oliver’s fantastic fish pie recipe again. Good things should be shared thrice right? It first went up 2 months after I started this website and over the years has remained one of the biggest posts for me. It’s also one of my all-time favourite comfort food recipes and the best fish pie I know.

The suggestion to eat this fish pie with baked beans in tomato sauce is an absolute must. Trust me when I say it’s delicious. I also like to serve it with steamed green beans that I have tossed with lemon juice, olive oil, and some chopped red onion.

How to make Jamie Oliver’s fish pie:

First, boil the water to make the mashed potatoes. You will also cook the eggs in this water so there is no need to use another pot.
Gently fry the vegetables while the potatoes are cooking, then add the spinach to wilt, cream, and mustard.
While the potatoes are boiling you can prepare the fish. This goes into this dish raw so there is no pre-cooking required.
Assemble the dish by mixing the raw fish with the vegetable and cream/cheese mixture. Add and mix in the grated cheese, lemon juice, and chopped parsley.
Nestle the quartered eggs into the fish mixture.
Mash your potatoes with loads of butter and dollop on top of the fish mixture.
Drizzle additional olive oil or melted butter over the potatoes to allow them to go a more golden brown (optional).

Can you make fish pie in advance?

You can make the fish pie in advance by assembling the pie and covering it with the mashed potato. Cover and refrigerate until you want to bake and serve it. This is better than baking it and reheating it again which could result in the fish being overcooked.

Can you freeze fish pie?

This is not the best dish to make and freeze because the fish will give off water in the freeze-thaw process. Mashed potato also does not thaw well. If you have to freeze it, do so before it is baked, and omit the boiled eggs from the recipe.

You might also like these delicious seafood recipes:

Prep Time:15

Cook Time:50

Ingredients

5 large potatoes peeled and diced about 3 cm
Salt and pepper
2 free-range eggs leave out if you don’t like them
2 handfuls spinach I used 1 x 200gms packet of baby spinach
1 onion finely chopped
1 carrot chopped/diced small – or grated
1 – 2 celery stalks finely diced
extra virgin olive oil for frying
250 ml cream
2 good handfuls of grated Mature Cheddar cheese or Parmesan or half and a half
juice of 1 lemon
1 heaped tsp Dijon mustard or English mustard
1 large handful of flat-leafed parsley finely chopped
500 gm- 650gms smoked haddock cut into biggish chunks. You could use any firm white fish – cod hake, kingklip or salmon. Or a mix of salmon and whitefish.
As much butter as you dare to add to your mash
Nutmeg optional – a light grating in the mash
Salt and pepper I like white pepper in this dish

Instructions

Preheat oven to 220 degrees C / 425F.
Chop all the things, juice the lemon and get everything ready to cook.
Boil the potatoes in salted water for a couple of minutes.
Add the 2 eggs and set a timer for 8 minutes. Remove when ready and plunge into cold water to cool. Peel and cut into quarters setting aside.
In a separate pan fry, the onion, carrot, and celery for about 5 minutes in the olive oil then add the cream and bring to a boil. add the spinach leaves and dijon and stir to wilt.
Place the fish into an appropriately sized oven dish and add the chopped parsley, lemon juice, and grated cheese. Pour over the vegetable and cream and mix together. Arrange the quartered eggs evenly across the mix pressing them in.
When potatoes are cooked, drain in the colander and mash with lashings of butter, and season with salt, pepper, and grated nutmeg. Spread over the top of the fish mixture.
You could drizzle a bit more oil or melted butter over the top to get a browner finish or sprinkle over more cheese if you really wanted to be decadent and get some more crunch
Bake for about 25 – 30 mins – until golden.
Serve with heated baked beans in tomato sauce and blanched green beans (or other green vegetables/salad of your choice)

Notes

This pie is best made just before serving.

If you want to freeze the pie, remove the eggs before doing so or omit them from the recipe.

Servings: 4

Author: Sam Linsell

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14 Comments

This is beautiful. When my now son-in-law first came for Thanksgiving, who’s British, I made something similar for him. I don’t remember how it compares, but yours sounds absolutely delicious!

I saw this recipe of Jamie posted someplace else and it said to serve the potatoes on top or below the fish, yours seems to put it on top, i plan to serve it on bottom and fish on top this time, as i did put extra cheese and a few bread crumbs on top of the fish mixture in the pan which was quite full . Well see how it turns out, your recipe doesnt really state to put the potatoes on top, unless i missed that step. I also added some procuitto to the onion carrot and celery mix and used dill instead of parsley.

Hi Rosemary, I have never seen this pie or any other fish pie where the potato is on the bottom. It would not be a pie then. The wet sauce would soak into the mash making it very wet and unpleasant. The image very clearly shows the mash on top. I have updated the recipe to be more specific

I’m confused about the eggs. it doesn’t say what to do with them…cook them for eight minutes with the boiling spuds…but then what?

Hi CW – apologies for the error, I have rectified the recipe. The eggs go in with the fish and vegetable mix and just before you add the potato on top

Hi Jamie. I like to use part sour cream instead of all plain cream in the recipe. makes it a bit more tangy.

I love to cook, but I’m not always the best at it. I watched Jamie Oliver’s fantastic fish pie video and was able to create a masterpiece of my own! This is an easy recipe that anyone can do.

I looked at other recipes which were basically, fish, potato eggs and white or cheese sauce. I like that this one has more vegetables added! The added spinach sounds yummo

How many people does this serve? I can’t tell if I’ll need to double the recipe.

Hi Katie, it serves 4 generously but easily 6 smaller portions with other sides

I must have added too much butter to the potatoes as when I went to take this out, it was very soupy. I stuck it under the broiler for a few minutes which sort of helped. If I make this next time, I’ll use a smaller dish and add salt to the cream mixture. I also used Cod so I wonder if the smoked haddock would have been better…I’ll try to find that.

Hi Megan, I think smoked fish (as I used really makes this dish) you could do half cod and half smoked cod. Your mash should not be runny at all. I have no idea what you did there. It should be dry and fairly stiff.

This recipe with its cream-based sauce sounds perfect for a friend’s weekend gathering that includes a coeliac, rather than fiddle with gluten free flour or other sauce thickeners. But… I want to cook it before I travel and then reheat thoroughly once I get there. Will it reheat ok? Also, would it freeze ok if I needed it to? Thanks.

Hi Jenny – glad you liked the sound of this fish pie. In my experience, mashed potato doesn’t really freeze well nor does the boiled egg. But it will work if you leave out the eggs. Often fish becomes watery when frozen/thawed so I have never done is before. I’m sure it will be ok but I haven’t tested it. Maybe better to freeze it before its been baked then thaw and bake it when you are ready. Making it in advance I would do the same. So make the pie, assemble it, cover it and refrigerate then bake it when you get there.

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