Fried fish sticks with french fries, dipped into a homemade tartar sauce—that's what I call summer comfort food. Fish sticks are also called fish fingers across the pond!
Global Food Recipes
with Spices and Herbs
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TL;DR
Fried fish sticks have never been considered health food because they are deep-fried. Yet, I love them; it's my comfort food! Fish sticks can be baked too, and they taste great baked as well if you prefer less oil in your food.
Imagine baked fish sticks served with baked home fries! I prepare fish sticks from scratch at least once or twice a month during the hotter days in the year, mostly on a Friday because Friday is fish day according to our customs in Europe.
Tips
Fish sticks are easy to prepare at home. Get a quality piece of fish fillet cut into smaller stick sizes and cover it with egg and some kind of coating such as breadcrumbs.
I like the simple breadcrumbs variation as a coating as it's the simplest, and if you are making fish fingers from scratch for the first time, try to use breadcrumbs to make it easier for you.
You could also use a different coating to suit your needs or to make the fish sticks gluten-free, such as with crushed Cornflakes, Panko and cornflour. The different coatings will create variations of fish fingers and will determine the crunchiness and, of course, the flavor.
Fish fingers sold commercially are mostly made with ground fish, and the ones made with real fish fillet are considered higher quality and are usually marked with a seal on the package.
White fish variations are suitable to prepare fish sticks. The meat should be tender but firm and should contain less fat.
Pick something like cod and flounder fish. If you are not sure which fish fillet to buy, ask your local fish seller; they will guide you if you mention that you are planning to make fish fingers.
You can get a big fresh filet piece and cut it into smaller ~3-inch-long sticks. Make sure that there are no bones left in the fish fingers and cut off any of those close to the fish skin dark grey/brown fish meat pieces, as those taste awful in fish fingers.
Make sure to cut off the brown fish meat, which is the bloodline and on the edge of the fish, and you are good to go. Then cover your fish sticks with scrambled raw egg, with your breadcrumbs herb mixture, and deep fry until golden crisp.
📖 Recipe
Homemade Fish Sticks Recipe with Herbs
Ingredients
- 12.3 ounces Fish Fillet
- 1 Egg
- 6 Tablespoons Bread Crumbs
- 1 Teaspoon Oregano Dried
- 1 Teaspoon Marjoram Dried optional
- ½ Teaspoon Salt
- ¼ Teaspoon Black Pepper Ground
- Cooking Oil to deep fry
Instructions
- Prepare your fish fillet first. Look out for any fish bones and skin remainders; cut off and discard. Cut your fish fillet into sticks and keep aside.12.3 ounces Fish Fillet
- In a bowl, scramble the raw egg and keep aside. Get another bowl and add the breadcrumbs, oregano, marjoram, salt, and pepper; mix that content well.1 Egg, 6 Tablespoons Bread Crumbs, 1 Teaspoon Oregano Dried, 1 Teaspoon Marjoram Dried, ½ Teaspoon Salt, ¼ Teaspoon Black Pepper Ground
- Now you need to cover the fish sticks one by one with the coating. You start by covering a fish stick with the scrambled egg, then directly place it into the breadcrumbs mixture bowl and cover it there equally with the breadcrumbs by rolling the fish stick into it. The egg is like a glue between the fish meat and breadcrumbs mixture; it will hold the coating together. Repeat the coating process until you have all the fish sticks ready and finished coated.
- At that point you can freeze some or all of your fish sticks by placing them carefully into Ziploc bags. Whenever you want to use them, just defrost the fish sticks completely first and then deep fry.
- To deep fry the fish sticks, heat oil in your fryer or in a deep frying pan. Wait until the oil is very hot; NEVER add the fish sticks when the oil is not hot. Test by sprinkling tiny amounts of breadcrumbs into the cooking oil; if it catches and starts to bubble around the breadcrumbs, you can add your fish fingers to the cooking oil. It might splash a little bit, so be careful and prepared. DON'T over crowd your pan, or they will take too long to cook; too crowded a pan reduces the heat of the oil a bit, which is not necessarily what you want when deep frying anything.Cooking Oil to deep fry
- Watch them carefully and turn them when they get golden on one side. Once the fish sticks are equally golden on both sides, which is a matter of a few minutes only, you can take them out by shaking off excess oil carefully and placing them into a previously prepared dish with paper kitchen towel. Tap them a bit dry to absorb excess oil with some more paper kitchen towel.
- Serve warm with tartar sauce, French fries, chips, or wedges and a small green salad with vinaigrette.
Notes
- You can bake the fish sticks too if you would rather not fry them. To bake, place the breaded fish sticks into a heatproof dish next to each other. Cover the fish sticks equally with some olive oil and place them to bake into the preheated oven at 180 C/350 F for about 12 minutes or until the fish is flaky.
- ~24 small fish sticks
- Pick a white fish like cod, halibut, or kebab, a fish that remains firm while frying and which tastes neutral (ask your fish guy).
Nutrition
Freezing Instructions
To freeze, cut a big piece of fish fillet, do the egg and breadcrumbs coating, place the fish fingers raw into zip-lock bags, and freeze.
Next time, you just need to take them out, leave them out a bit to defrost, and then just deep fry.
This works well with a breadcrumb coating; however, I would not suggest freezing when you use another coating such as cornflakes, because the cornflakes will get soggy while defrosting.
Serving
Personally, I don't just consume fish fingers as a snack; I actually prefer them as a main meal with homemade french fries, served with tartar dipping sauce and a light green salad with vinaigrette dressing.
Or another popular version of serving fish fingers in my house is with red cabbage or some kind of mash potato variation.
Dipping sauces:
- Tartar Sauce
- Curried Mayo
- Curried Ketchup
- Lemon Yogurt Dip
- Sriracha Mayo
Such wonderful crunchy looking fish fingers. I love fish a lot,abd keep trying various fish dishes, though never tried fish fingers. They are looking so yummy that I am now tempted to make them as soon as possible.
Hi Vandana,
You can try adding a few chili flakes instead of herbs to the breadcrumbs mixture before covering the fish sticks with it. Enjoy the fish fingers, we will be looking forward to your feedback. 🙂
Catholic school, fish fries, everyone volunteering and going home smelling like fish (for like 3 days, almost tile the next Friday LOL)…yep! This was my childhood too 🙂 Great job on the fish sticks!
My mom used to bake packaged fish sticks once a week when I was a kid. Not very good, alas -- kinda turned me off of them. But I've had fresh fish sticks, like yours, and they're wonderful! Super recipe -- thanks.
I grew up in India where my mum would buy a kind of boneless fish especially to make fish fingers. She would marinate fish pieces in salt, chilli powder and lemon juice before dipping in egg and breadcrumbs and shallow frying. Tasted absolutely divine, nothing like the commercial stuff we get here in UK! I like your idea of using herbs and also baking them, Helen. Thanks for this lovely recipe..took me back to my childhood days 🙂
Hi Meena,
Thank you for sharing your precious childhood memories with us. I wish I could say the same about my childhood with fish fingers. We hardly got fresh fish in the alps in Europe, where I grew up, so fish would be usually used otherwise. If you have a sea, you get plentiful fish to turn into delicious dishes such as your mother did with added chili powder and lemon juice. I will try your mother's fish fingers sometime, it sounds absolutely delicious. 🙂
I love fish stick but they need a really good crunch. Looks like your recipe achieves that. I can hear the crunch. 🙂
What a great tutorial-I wonder if these could be the ticket to get my son to eat fish, haha! Of course it's fried, but who knows, perhaps it's the entry-level fish experience that we need to get started. 🙂
What a great alternative to chicken nuggets for the kids!
I grew up with fish fingers but not such good looking ones. We were getting ours at supermarkets and god knows what they were filled with. I need to try these with a good quality fish!
What a delicious recipe and way to get the kids to eat fish.
These sound awesome, very reminiscent of the fish fingers of my childhood only with better quality fish and much more grown up 😀
We eat fish a lot but not deep fried, I would try and oven bake these, it's not warm enough yet to stop using the oven.
They look super crunch!