In which the Rodent makes fish pie.

Today's not a bad day, although I am considering a nap before people turn up tonight. I woke up at half past four in the morning again and used the time to clean up, watch telly and get Pol his breakfast.

I don't feel quite up to going out, but given all of yesterday's activity, that is to be expected. I did have enough energy to make a fish pie.

This is my first attempt at a home made fish pie, so the recipe follows exactly what happened. The final recipe will of course be altered to produce a better result.

Home made fish pie.

Take two fillets of coley defrosted the night before.
Put on baking tray and sprinkle with sunflower oil.
Add a lime leaf to the top of each and cover only the top of each fillet with a tinfoil hat to protect it from scorching and thetans.
Place into cold oven because you forgot to preheat, at gas mark 4
Set timer for fifteen minutes.

Peel and slice five small/medium maris piper or other mashing potatoes.
Cover in cold water in a thin-walled pan and put on to cook. Immediately wash knife and chopping board to guard them from starch thetans.

Place about 30g/quarter of an inch of butter in a heavy-bottomed pan at a low heat. While it's melting, grate a sad little carrot which, while not at all rotten, is about a day past its best. Put grated carrot into the bottom of a small casserole which holds about three pints.

To the melted butter, add about a dessert spoonful and a half of wholemeal flour. Reflect on the sadness that leads to using wholemeal flour and thus turns white sauces beige. Leave to cook for a surprsingly long time on a low heat, to rid roux of all possible traces of flouriness (probably thetan-attracting).

Take God's gift to brocolli, which is emerald green and splendid and has been lording it over the sad carrot for the last day or so. Chop off a few florets and then finely chop until it's all little tiny green bits, because who wants to bite into a fish pie and get a soggy mouthful of brocolli? I like brocolli, but it has to know its place. Add to casserole with carrot. There should be about equal volumes of green bits and orange bits. Add same quantity of sweetcorn as there is of carrot and stir. Reassure delicate little vegetables that no one is going to pour tinned soup over them.

Stir roux, which is beginning to smell agreeably bicuitlike. Become alarmed at spitting noises from oven, and scared that the fish is going to be all scorched and dead. Pull out and examine. Discover it needs about another five minutes. Glance at timer, which has another five minutes to run. Feel smug.
Put fish back in oven, then stir roux harshly and add about half a cup from half a litre/just under a pint of semi-skimmed milk. Whisk very thoroughly and quickly add more before it turns into actual pastry and causes lumps. Whisking makes white (or beige) sauce feel loved. Once you've added enough to leave the end result looking like thin cream, if thin cream was beige and had bits of bran in it, turn up the heat just a little. Whisk very thoroughly one more time as a gesture of love, then leave it to do other things.

(At this point, if I had trouble standing, I would pour the sauce into a glass bowl and nuke it for a minute or two at a time until it had thickened to my satisfaction).

Turn oven off with two minutes left to go. Turn potatoes down and turn them over. Stir white (or beige) sauce. Chop a small onion finely, then eye vegetables and seemingly huge pile of onion. Add about half the onion to the mix and mutter about waste while discarding other half. Remove fish from oven and flake it into the veg. Be agreeably surprised at the pleasant, entirely foodlike smell which comes up. Stir sauce.

Turn potatoes off, empty into colander, then empty colander back into pan. Wash colander immediately to rid it of starch thetans. Go back to sauce, which can take just about anything except lack of attention. Whisk again to tell it you love it and then shake in dried or fresh parsley until the smell changes from a biscuity smell to a wonderful, only slightly herby parsley sauce smell. Adjust until the smell of the sauce seems like it would go well with the veg and fish mix. Add sauce to mix and discover that of course there's too much, but not by that much. Stir what is now finished pie mix and put to one side.

Mash potatoes, adding a pinch or two of nutmeg. You want enough to give a certain something, but not nearly enough to actually be able to tell the something is nutmeg. Spoon potatoes onto pie. Smooth over with a fork, reliving childhood days in nursery school and leaving patterns. Put pie into oven at gas mark 4 and set timer for half an hour.

Clean up kitchen, feeling good about life. Turn to leave, only to discover potato pan which has been beset by starch thetans. Battle and destroy all thetans, then clean up resulting mess from counter tops. Retire to the computer, cuppa in hand. Discover an hour later the timer has failed to go off, that the pie is fine and that next time you'll put it in at gas mark 6.

Next time I will also add butter and cream or milk to the mash, since it's a little too plain without.

Migraine pain got a little thumpy, about sixish, and then got splatted with tramadol. It's now down to a barely annoying three and spiking five only when kids play football outside. The pain bothers me less than the thumping.