The Best Homemade Fish and Chips
The Best Homemade Fish and Chips
Fish and chips have to be one of Britain’s best-loved meals. There may not be a “chippy’ on every corner as once there was, but there’s enough of them around enough for when the desire strikes.
Making fish and chips at home makes sense as they are just as delicious and such fun to make and this recipe shows you why.
A couple of pointers though, I find the best fish is either Cod, Pollock or Haddock and choose the freshest fish, frozen is also fine but make sure it is thoroughly defrosted and dry with kitchen paper first.
Chips must be chips and under not, under any circumstance fries, well not if you want to make a real portion. Use a floury potato for the chips such as King Edward or Maris Piper.
Prepare the batter and only dip the fish at the last moment before plunging into hot oil to fry so this way you will always have a light and crisp snap to the batter. Enjoy these fish and chips; I think they are the best.
Ingredients:
For the Batter:
55g plain flour
55g cornflour
Pinch salt
Pinch black pepper
1 teaspoon baking powder
4 tablespoon beer (not lager)
4 tablespoon sparkling water
For the Fish:
4 fish fillets
For the Chips:
1 kilo peeled potatoes
1-litre vegetable oil or beef dripping
Make the batter
- Keep back 2 tablespoons of the flour and furiously whisk together the remaining ingredients then put the batter to one side to rest for 30 minutes, occasionally whisking to prevent lumps.
Make the chips
- Cut the potatoes into 1cm x 1cm fat chips and rinse them under cold water.
- Drop the chips into a pan of lightly boiling, salted water and simmer for 3 minutes. Drain and dry carefully with kitchen paper and then put into the fridge to chill down.
Time for the fish
- Once the batter is rested, pat the fish fillets with kitchen paper and season lightly with a little salt.
- Heat the oil/fat to 160C in a deep-fat fryer or large, deep saucepan and carefully drop in a good handful of chips then cook for a few minutes making sure they do not turn brown. Remove from the fat and drain. Continue until you have blanched all the chips.
- Put the reserved flour onto a flat plate and toss in a fish fillet to lightly dust with flour and shake to remove any excess then dip the fish into the batter and then gently lower the fish into the hot oil then repeat with the remaining three if you have room in the pan. It is important to be able to move the fillets around, so do not pack them in like sardines. Fry the fish for about 8 mins turning the fish frequently or until the batter is crisp and golden brown. Remove from the oil and drain on kitchen paper then cover and keep warm in the oven.
- Heat the oil to 190C and cook the chips for a further 5 minutes or until they are crisp and golden and serve immediately with mushy peas if you like them and don’t forget the salt and vinegar.
Serve your fish and chips with mushy peas (you either love them or hate them) and salt and vinegar.