Crispy Fish Cakes with a Soft Sour Cream & Onion mash either Pan Fried, Deep Fried, or just Oven Baked. Flash Fry and Freeze to reheat later.

With this recipe I wanted to recreate the kind that my father use to buy us when we were kids. I forget the Brand or even where they are from. What I do remember is that they had a soft inside mash with a sour cream taste and I believe some Dill Weed and some Green Onions. These were the best heated up in the oven and topped with Ketchup. I wanted to hit this or surpass it and that I did. These just brought back that nostalgic feelings so much while I was eating them. These are just awesome to prepare a bunch ahead of time and when the snackies hit, pop these into the oven and bake.

Stack & Steam Cookware set

A Stack & Steam Cookware set is the perfect cookware set to make Fish Cakes. It is used to steam the potatoes, cook the fillets and finally to flash fry before they go into the oven.

Fish Cakes Ingredients

Consisting of seasoned Mashed Potatoes & Fish, using Haddock, Cod, or Pollock. Processed through the classic breading station with seasoned Flour, Eggs, and Panko Flakes or Bread Crumbs before being Flash Fried in Oil.

Potato to Fish Ratio

With two main components of Potato & Fish, preference will vary. The ratio of Potato to Fish might be preferable to some as 1:1 to 5:1 and everything in between. Whether you think Fish Cakes should be mostly Fish with some Potato or mostly Potato with some Fish is entirely based on preference.

A good medium is 3:1, Potato to Fish and some help from Hondashi. Establish this for yourself and adjust everything else around that. The recipe below uses about 1200 g of Potatoes to 400 g of fish (about 3-4 fillets) to make up 12 large Fish Cakes.

Fish

This recipe is made with Cod, Haddock, or Pollock. I typically pick up Frozen Cod or Haddock Fillets and use a few for Fish & Chips and the remaining for Fish Cakes, Fish Fillet Dinners, or Chowders.

How to Cook fish for Fish Cakes

Cook Fish either frozen or thawed in a pan over medium high heat, breaking it up as it cooks with a few Tbl of Butter and a small Onion shredded or minced. Cook until all the water has evaporated.

This recipe uses a bit of Sugar, Hondashi, shredded Onion to cook with the Fish. Green Onions are added last to cook for about 1 minute.

Mashed Potatoes

There are two options for the Potato filling in Fish Cakes, mashed and coarsely mashed. Mashed Potatoes will yield a Soft & Creamy inside while coarsely mashed will have bits of Potato chunks scattered throughout. It’s really a matter of preference.

How to make Fish Cake Potato Filling

Steam the Russet or White Potatoes for better flavor, instead of boiling them. Cook until just tender. Either mash or coarsely mash the Potatoes.

For mashed Potatoes, Slice the Potato in half lengthwise then quarter each half and steam until soft. Run the Potatoes through a ricer. Then combine all the ingredients for the filling adding the egg last when the Potatoes have cooled some.

Coarsely mashed Potatoes requires that the Potatoes be diced small before steaming. Then roughly mashed up so that you still end up with bits of diced Potatoes in the filling.

Sour Cream Fish Cake Seasoning

Sour Cream & Onion Popcorn seasoning (picked up at my local Bulk Barn) is the main seasoning in these Fish Cakes along with Dillweed & Parsley. Onion & Green Onions are added for additional Flavor. With White Pepper for a smidge of heat, and Hondashi cooked with the Fish to bolster up the Seafood taste. Hondashi is an excellent ingredient to add with seafood dishes.

Chili Flakes or Aleppo Flakes can be exchanged with the White Pepper.

These ingredients come together very nicely in creating that Crispy Fish Cake with very soft flavorful inside mash.

How to Make Fish Cakes

Steam the Potatoes and cook the Fish in a pan over medium high heat until all the water has evaporated. Combine the seasoned mashed Potatoes with the cooked Fish and mix well. Move on to shaping and freezing the Fish Cakes for easier handling when it comes time to bread them and cook.

How to Shape Fish Cakes

Use a 3 Inch cookie cutter placed on a baking sheet and filled with the filling. Repeat for each one until all the filling is used up and the baking sheet is lined with perfectly round Fish Cakes. Place the baking tray into the freezer to freeze fully so that they are easier to handle when breading.

You want the Fish Cakes frozen solid, as they quickly defrost when you take them out of the freezer. Work fast to batter them and fry quickly just to crisp and brown. Then finish off in the oven at 350 F or lay them back on the tray to freeze and reheat at a later time.

Breading Station

The breading consist of 3 items that come together in a basic breading station to bread foods for cooking.

• Seasoned Flour
• Egg Wash
• Bread Crumbs or Panko or a Mix of Both

A Thick Breading runs the food item by coating in the Egg wash, Seasoned Flour, Egg wash then into the final Breading. This builds a nice thick crust.

For a Thin Breading, go from Seasoned Flour, Egg to final Breading.

Cooking Fish Cakes

Once you have the Fish Cakes ran through the breading station they are ready for flash frying all of them. Either Pan Fry or Deep Fry until golden brown at 350 F.

Panko Crusted will take longer than those that are breaded with Bread Crumbs. In the case of oven Fish Cakes, they are browned as they cook due to the extra fat added to the last Breading. Whereas the Fried ones are flash fried for color and finished in the oven or Flash Fried and then frozen to cook in the oven at a later time.

Pan Fried Fish Cakes

This method requires you to be diligent and careful when handling not only the Fish Cakes but in controlling the heat so that you stay around the 350 F mark.

Place the breaded Fish Cakes into a pan with some oil heated to 350 F to cover half way to 1/2 – 3/4 of the Fish Cakes, Flip over gently and brown the other side just lightly. Finish however many you want to consume in the oven at 350 F and freeze the rest to be cooked later.

Be careful at this step. The Fish Cakes get hard to handle. You want to control the heat. As well as gently flip them over and away from you with the help of two Spatulas. They are only deep fried for color, so just a few minutes. You can splash some oil on top as well while the bottom is cooking to help brown the top.

Deep Fried Fish Cakes

This is by far the easiest to do. Just place the Fish Cakes into the basket and then lower to crisp up to get good light color at 350 F, about 2-3 minutes for Panko Crusted and about 1 minute for Bread Crumb Crusted. Lift the basket and carefully transfer them back to the baking sheet.

Finish however many you want to consume in the oven at 350 F and freeze the rest to be cooked later.

If you choose the deep fryer for fish cakes, then the oil is only good for seafood after that. You can let it cool and place the oil in a container and refrigerate if you choose to use the deep fryer method. The Pan Fry uses considerable less oil that can be stored in the fridge afterwards, but requires more attention.

Oven Baked Fish Cakes

Combine 1/4 C of Fat, either Butter or Lard per 1 cup of Panko Flakes. Bread and pop into the oven at 350 F for about 30 minutes, flipping them over carefully halfway through. Bread and Freeze the remaining to cook at a later time.