Sweet potato and peppered mackerel fishcakes

Sometimes you can have a “eureka” moment when you are cooking. These fishcakes were one of those flashes of inspiration! Jacqui and I love sweet potato - roasted, baked, mashed, in soup, with salad, on pizza. But we also love smoked peppered mackerel – in salad, with vegetables, on bread, as a pate. We like to think of these fishcakes as instant brain food, a perfect pick-me-up after essay writing. Fishcakes at first seem a little daunting, it may seem easier to just go and buy them but then you will not know what has gone into your fishcakes and you miss out on the satisfaction of making something tasty and healthy completely from scratch!

We hope you make it to the stage of creating the fishcakes. We are both guilty of eating the mixture straight from the bowl instead of actually spending five minutes to finish them. Let us know if you manage it! We tend to work on the ratio of one sweet potato to two smoked mackerel fillets. If the potatoes are big, find big fillets and vice-versa.

Makes 4 medium fishcakes

Prep time: 20 minutes

Cooking time: 5 minutes

1 Sweet potato
2 Smoked peppered mackerel fillets
1 Red onion
1 sprig of rosemary

Flour for rolling cakes
Drizzle of oil

Wash and cube the sweet potato into similar size chunks. We tend to leave the skin on as it contains a lot of the nutrients (and it just makes the whole thing quicker!) Place in a pan of boiling water and allow to simmer until tender – a knife should go through them easily.

Peel and cut the onion into chunks. Caramelise with some oil in a frying pan, adding the rosemary half way through.

Drain the sweet potato and mash all of the chunks until smooth. Take the skin off the two mackerel fillets and flake them into the potatoes. Add the caramelised onion. Mix well. Have a little taste but try not to get as carried away as we do!

Put some flour onto a plate or clean surface. Divide the mixture into four and pick up and mould into cake shapes. Roll each side lightly in flour so it is not sticky any more. Repeat with remaining mixture.

Heat up some olive oil in a frying pan and place the fishcakes on the heated pan. Flip when it is golden brown on the first side. You can always perfect their shape using the back of a spatula when they are in the pan. They only take a few minutes on each side so you need to be there ready to turn them.

Serve with a big salad, roasted vegetables or home made chips! We often put a few tomatoes into roast as we start the fishcakes as they make a really fantastic alternative to ketchup.

We have had a crazy last week so we apologise for putting the blog on hold. Expect lots of posts from now on!

Charlotte & Jacqueline

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