This was going to be a column on the plight of fishermen and the horrors of factory trawlers. I’d also undoubtedly have touched on that most mealy-mouthed of disingenuous words, “bycatch”. I was also going to include an in-depth discourse on the ageing of fish, just like the dry ageing Josh Niland does in Sydney and the various umami-boosting preservation techniques like zuke (marination) and kelp curing that Hokkaido-born Masaki Saito employs at his two-star in New York.

It would have been an all right column, but at the end of the day you probably already know that dry-ageing fish, if done right, develops flavours and makes for a firmer texture, but if done wrong leaves you with a pasty sludge-puddle that wafts ammonia. And me bleating about over-fishing will do little good other than help make me feel better. Plus it’s certainly not a problem that one column can solve. It might take a couple…

But then my sister reminded me that we were both victims of aged fish when we were kids, in the form of my mother’s dreaded and inedible fish pie… and the memories came flooding back in all their monochrome glory.

It was in those days of dodgy refrigeration and a distribution system that ensured any fish you bought had been out of the water for a few days already. Back then, all fish was aged, but not in a good way.

It wasn’t until I smelt fresh fish that had come straight from the water that I understood the pleasures of its delicate, white flesh and fresh ozonic fragrance. And it was only then that I realised how much old fish I’d eaten.

So, my earliest fish memory was actually the viscous stench of boiled coley for the cat that hung in every corner of the house. I say “for the cat”, but I now know that part of it ended up in that dreaded Friday fish pie.

Like all good Catholic families, Fridays were a day of observance and the worst culinary oppression of Catholicism. My mother’s fish pie was a penance to be paid for all the good food she’d cook the rest of the week. The cat was the only one of the household who always seemed happier on Fridays; enjoying, as cats do, the suffering of us having to eat what she was forced to endure every day of the week. I’m sure my mother told us it was cod in the pie, but the cat knew better.

This was a drab time of grey suburbs, grey school jumpers and grey days. The fish pie fitted right in. It was a symphony of grey: watery grey gravy, grey gelatinous fish and grey mashed potato from a packet. That was then and this is now. The fish pie here shares nothing in common with my mother’s, other than the name. It is fully rehabilitated and now quite distinctly edible.

See here for Matt’s version of his mother’s fish pie.