Young Love

Our newly engaged daughter and her fiance turned up at our front door with a beautiful fresh fish - still warm from the smoker, balanced on the upturned palm of his hand, held at shoulder height - no plate in sight - he was clearly delighted with his 'work do' catch and keen to share the spoils with us old folks! He reminded me of a European waiter. Priceless!!!

We enjoy our four young adult daughters and their men. They are now our good friends and help to keep us feeling young! Their lively thinking on the issues of life helps keeps us fresh too.

When our own love was still young my Darling Man used to sometimes visit me at our flat at lunchtime and I would make smoked fish in white sauce on toast for him. I guess that was when I first discovered the 'desire to make something for someone, for no other reason than to please him.' It's still one of his favorite meals to this day. Although now I make the slightly more sophisticated version of Smoked Fish Pie. So the fish from the kids got flaked and sauced for our dinner!

Last Christmas I spent many therapeutic hours making each of our girls a recipe book. Each one hand-pasted and scrapbook-y - full of photos, family culinary history and all the recipes that are significant and memorable to our family. Naturally it includes the Smoked Fish Pie recipe and the story of our young love including a snippet of one of my Darling Man's 'love letters' he wrote to me while he was away working in Australia. We have now been together for nigh on 30 years! It's our long, shared personal history that helps to hold us together. And Smoked Fish Pie is just a wee bit of it.....

Smoked Fish Pie.
25 gms butter
1 TBLSPN milk
3 cups cooked, mashed potatoes
3/4 tsp salt
black pepper
1 TBLSPN butter
1 TBLSPN flour
1 cup milk
500 gm can smoked fish, flaked (or the real McCoy!)
1 TBLSPN chopped parsley
2 hard-boiled eggs

Mix first measure of butter and milk into the potatoes, beating with a fork to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Line a 20 cm pie dish with half the potatoes. Set remaining potatoes aside. Heat second measure of butter in a saucepan. Stir in flour and cook until frothy. Gradually add second measure of milk, stirring constantly until sauce boils and thickens. Remove from heat. Add fish, parsley and eggs. Pour this mixture into the lined pie dish. Cover with remaining potato. Cook at 190 deg C for 20 minutes or until pale golden.
Serves 4 - 6.