Friday Night Fish Cakes

We had these every Friday night during Lent as kids, and even now they're a quick supper faithful.  I tend to tart them up a bit from this basic recipe with the addition of some Red or Green Curry Paste, or some Sweet Chilli Sauce (both in the recipe and on the side), or maybe some finely chopped green or red capsicum or other veggies, some grated cheese ... really anything goes but you don't want to turn it into a garbage dump either.

These are the amounts I use but you may want to change them in the interests of taste or economy or size of family - eg increase amount of potato to stretch them further.  I usually serve these with a big mixed salad and some Sweet Chilli Sauce and/or Tomato Sauce on the side for dipping.

Serves 4 - 6

Ingredients:

Method:

Peel and quarter the potatoes.  Boil or microwave until tender, drain in a colander and place a dry tea towel over them (this is a good trick when making mashed potatoes of any kind; the tea towel absorbs steam from the spuds leaving you with much drier and fluffier spuds and hence a lighter mash) to cool a little (just until easy to handle, you don't want them to get stone cold).

Place potatoes in a large bowl, drizzle olive oil over.  Using a fork, not a potato masher, squash the potatoes until smooth-ish.  I don't like my fish cakes too smooth, preferring some texture, hence the rough crushing as opposed to whipping (gee, sounds kinda S&M-ish). 

Drain the pink salmon - use the best quality you can afford - and flake into the potato.  Again, I like some texture so don't mix so much that its a mousse.  Add in the finely chopped garlic, ginger, chilli and spring onions and combine. 

Add the eggs, cornflour, green peas and any other extras at this point.  Season with a little salt and pepper, and 1/2 teaspoon of miscellaneous dried herbs - eg basil, oregano, parsley.  Of course you can use fresh, but this is a decidedly un-gourmet family dish, and should be easy to prepare out of what you have in the cupboard ... so, dried herbs.   Combine well but don't mix too hard (remember: texture).

Set out a plate with a few tablespoons of extra cornflour sprinkled over it.  Taking handfuls of mixture (about two tablespoons) form it into balls, roll in the cornflour and place on another plate, forming into patties.  If the look like they are not sticking together, you will need to add a little more liquid either another beaten egg or even a dribble of milk. 

Heat a couple of tablespoons canola oil in a large non stick frying pan until hot.  Place up to six patties in the pan and fry for five to ten minutes on each side.  Don't (a) turn too much during frying but do check that while they do become golden brown and develop a nice crust, turning too much can make them fall apart; also (b) don't overcrowd the pan, you want a good bit of space between the patties as overcrowding will lower the heat of the pan and they'll stew rather than fry which is not a good thing, so fry in batches until all are done.

Keep fish cakes warm on a plate lightly covered with alfoil, in a low oven, until finished cooking.  They taste better if left to cool down and "set" a little than if eaten immediately out of the pan (they are just too hot and the flavours aren't developed enough).

These are surprisingly good cold, too.