The No-Brainer Tip To Avoid Overcooking Your Fish Pie
Foodies might be more familiar with handling raw fish in the realms of classic ceviche and tuna crudo. But, according to Roberta Muir of Be Inspired Food-Wine-Travel, raw fish also belongs in your seafood pot pies and fisherman's pies. In fact, opting for raw fish may be the easiest way to avoid accidentally overcooking that precious ingredient in the oven. "There's no need to cook the fish before baking the pie," says Muir, in an exclusive interview with Tasting Table. "Stir it into the filling raw."
Traditional fish pie (aka fisherman's pie) marries funky, meaty fish in a rich, hearty cream sauce with tender veggies, all housed in a flaky pie crust or beneath a plush, golden, buttery layer of mashed-potato topping, depending on your preferred assembly. Most recipes call for the fish to be milk-poached before mixing into the filling. However, Muir explains, "As the filling for a fish pie is generally quite moist, the fish tends to stay juicy regardless of cooking time. By the time the pastry is crisp and golden it will be cooked."
Fish pie is the ultimate elevated comfort fare with complex flavor structure and compelling textural interplay. It's an easy way to serve a crowd (made even easier by Muir's shortcut pro-tip), not to mention wildly customizable. Alongside the fish, that filling can be bulked up with vegetables from leeks to Spanish onions, potatoes, corn, carrots, and peas. For a bolder sauce, feel free to stir in a spike of dijon mustard, horseradish, or some smoky gruyere.
Don't cook your fish before stuffing it into the pie
Poaching as a cooking technique is all about high moisture and low heat, making it a reliable way to cook delicate fish without zapping its moisture. However, milk-poaching fish can infamously yield an overall one-note, homogenous taste — which is totally forgivable and rescue-able when it all gets slammed into a pot pie with other flavorful ingredients. Still, in the case of pot pie, that customary milk-poaching doesn't do anything spectacular for taste, and according to Muir, it isn't even necessary for proper cooking.
As long as fish is cooked to an internal temperature of 145 degrees Fahrenheit, it's perfectly safe to eat. Happily, the sweet-spot internal temp for oven-baked pies is 165 to 180 degrees Fahrenheit, meaning your fish will have no trouble cooking to completion. For failsafe results, opt for flaky white fish like cod or haddock. These don't require much doctoring-up to present a naturally sweet, accessible, not-overly-fishy flavor. They also become texturally fork-tender without any extended cooking times. Whichever type of fish you select, Muir has one more piece of advice, saying, "Cutting the fish into roughly even-sized pieces ensures it cooks evenly." If you're using frozen instead of fresh fish, be sure to thoroughly defrost it first to avoid trapping any unwelcome excess moisture inside your pie.