A difficult recipe for pike cutlets in homemade gravy step by step with photos. Easy to prepare at home in 10 minutes. Contains only 327 kilocalories.
- Preparation time: 10 minutes
- Cooking time: 10 min
- Calorie Amount: 327 kilocalories
- Number of servings: 8 servings
- Complexity: Not an easy recipe
- National cuisine: home kitchen
- Type of dish: Cutlets
Ingredients for eight servings
- Pike - 2 pcs. (1 kg)
- White bread – 100 g
- Onions – 1 pc.
- Milk – 0.5 cups
- Vegetable oil - 5 tbsp. spoons
- Chicken egg - 1-2 pcs.
- Ground black pepper - to taste
- Salt - to taste
- For the gravy:
- Carrots - 1 pc.
- Onions - 1 pc.
- Tomato paste - 1 tbsp. spoon
- Salt - to taste
- Pepper - to taste
- Bay leaf (optional) - 1 pc.
- Water - 0.4 l
Step-by-step preparation
- How to cook pike cutlets in gravy: Clean the pike, cut off the head, gut it, rinse well.
- Peel, wash and cut the onion into cubes.
- Heat a frying pan, pour in vegetable oil. Place onion in hot oil. Fry the onion over medium heat, stirring, for 2-3 minutes. Cool.
- Soak the loaf (without crust) in milk for 5 minutes. Then squeeze out the loaf.
- Separate the pike meat from the bones. Pass the pike fillet, squeezed loaf, stewed onion and butter through a meat grinder. Beat the egg into the minced meat. Salt and pepper. Mix the minced meat well until smooth.
- Heat the frying pan. Pour in vegetable oil. Form cutlets with wet hands and place them in hot oil. Fry the pike cutlets on both sides over medium heat until lightly golden (about 1 minute on each side).
- Then place the cutlets in the cauldron.
- Make gravy. To do this, boil the kettle. Peel and wash the onions and carrots. Grate the carrots on a coarse grater, cut the onion into small cubes.
- Heat a frying pan, pour in vegetable oil. Place prepared onions and carrots into hot oil. Simmer over medium heat, stirring, for 2-3 minutes.
- Add tomato, salt and pepper, stir. Pour boiling water over it. If desired, you can add bay leaf.
- Pour the prepared gravy over the cutlets.
- Bring the cutlets to a boil, cover with a lid. Simmer the pike cutlets on the lowest heat for 10-15 minutes.
- Pike cutlets in gravy are ready. Serve with your favorite side dish. Bon appetit!
Fish dishes must be included in the diet to make it healthy and nutritious. Tender, deliciously juicy fish cutlets are a great alternative to baked or fried fish. A variety of sauces that can be served with cutlets give them an amazing taste. What sauce should I prepare for fish cutlets?
Sour cream sauce
You can make tender cutlets from dense, elastic cod meat. They are especially tasty if you serve them with sour cream fish cutlet sauce. Its preparation will take a few minutes and will not require a large amount of ingredients. This gravy is ideal for meatballs cooked in the oven. Both an adult and a picky little person who doesn’t really like healthy fish will eat them with pleasure.
Required ingredients:
- a piece of sweet cream butter (as much as will fit in a tablespoon);
- four tablespoons of sour cream;
- two teaspoons of flour;
- a teaspoon of grated horseradish (you can take ready-made store-bought);
- half a glass of broth (fish), can be replaced with the same amount of milk;
- some favorite herbs to taste (green onions, dill, parsley are suitable);
- salt to taste.
- Melt the butter in a frying pan, avoiding burning. To do this, it is important to monitor the temperature of the bottom by placing the frying pan over medium heat.
- When the butter has melted, add the sifted flour, stirring vigorously constantly, and fry until a honey hue appears.
- Pour in the broth or milk and, stirring vigorously, stir the mass so that all the flour lumps disperse.
- Boil the sauce for the cod fish cutlets for about three minutes.
- As soon as it thickens, add sour cream and horseradish, add salt, mix and simmer under the lid for just a minute.
- Keep covered for about five minutes.
- While the gravy is infusing, chop the greens very finely.
- Place the oven-baked cutlets on serving plates.
Before serving the dish, add finely chopped fresh herbs to the gravy, mix and serve the fish cutlets in sour cream sauce to the table.
Tomato sauce
An excellent sauce for fish cutlets can be prepared with thick tomato paste. It is especially good for pike dishes, which can be cooked in the oven. When baked correctly, it melts in your mouth and is very tasty.
Required ingredients:
- half a glass of thick tomato paste;
- a quarter glass of flavored ketchup;
- the same amount of liquid sour cream;
- two tablespoons of white flour;
- one and a half glasses of hot boiled water or fish broth;
- two teaspoons of butter;
- fresh or dried herbs (depend on your own taste);
- a little medium grind salt;
- spice mixture for fish dishes;
- a mixture of ground peppers.
Cooking sequence:
- Turn on the oven at 200°. It should warm up thoroughly while the sauce for the pike fish cakes is being prepared.
- Heat a dry frying pan.
- Add the amount of flour, fry it until creamy, rubbing out any lumps.
- Place pieces of butter in a heated frying pan and combine with flour until the mixture is homogeneous.
- Add tomato paste and ketchup, pour in hot water or broth, grind all ingredients well.
- When the liquid begins to boil, add herbs, salt, pepper and spices to taste, stir again.
- Place the formed fish cubes in a baking dish.
- Pour the resulting gravy over them and place them in a preheated oven.
- Simmer fish cutlets in tomato sauce for about 45 minutes, lowering the temperature to 180°. Depending on the features of the oven, the cutlets may bake a little longer or faster.
- Place the finished white pike cutlets on plates and serve with your favorite side dish or sliced vegetables.
Cream sauce
The creamy sauce for fish cutlets, the recipe for which is given below, has a subtle creamy taste and a spicy aroma of nutmeg, lemon zest and oregano. It is better to cook it separately and serve it with fried or baked cutlets with a crispy crust. For lovers of melt-in-your-mouth dishes, you can bake fish cutlets with sauce in the oven. This method allows you to get a lower-calorie dish and is suitable for those who are losing weight or simply watching their figure.
Required ingredients:
- half a glass of heavy cream (drinkable cream with a fat content of 10 to 20% is suitable);
- half a glass of hot water (you can take fish broth or a ready-made cube);
- a tablespoon of white flour;
- the same amount of oil;
- small lemon;
- half a teaspoon of ground nutmeg;
- a quarter teaspoon of oregano;
- a little salt.
Cooking sequence:
- To cook fish cutlets in the oven with cream and spice sauce, you need to brew the flour base as described in previous recipes.
- First, cut the zest from the lemon with a special device or the small side of a grater, and also squeeze out a tablespoon of fresh lemon juice.
- Then fry the flour in unsalted butter.
- Pour hot water (or broth) into a frying pan, add lemon juice and bring everything to a boil. It is important that the flour lumps disperse.
- Boil the mixture over low heat (five minutes is enough), adding lemon zest and cream.
- A minute before the end of simmering, season everything with salt, oregano, and nutmeg.
- Let the gravy sit for literally three minutes under the lid, then pour into the gravy boat.
- Serve fish cutlets in creamy sauce with a side dish of rice or potatoes, stewed vegetables or a light vegetable salad.
- If desired, the dish can be flavored with finely chopped dill; the recipe allows for this.
- If the cue balls are baked in the oven, then all components must be combined and heated for two minutes. Then place the formed unfried meatballs in a mold or on a baking sheet, pour in gravy and bake as described above.
Secrets of a delicious sauce for fish cutlets
- The sauce for fish cutlets is delicious to prepare not only with fish broth, but also with any other broth. Suitable for gravy, for example, a decoction of vegetables, herbs, meat. An unusual recipe will make the taste different from the original, but it has its own piquancy.
- It is undesirable to use metal spoons, forks, paddles, etc. when heating and mixing gravy. Metal does not have the most favorable effect on the components of the dish, causing them to oxidize. And this spoils not only the color, but also the taste of the finished product. In addition, it can quickly deteriorate.
- If you need to quickly cook a sauce for fish cutlets, just stir a glass of sour cream in half a liter of boiled water, add salt, add any spices and brew a spoonful of flour fried in oil with the resulting base. This is a simple basic recipe that can be varied as much as you like.
- Coriander, turmeric, thyme, basil, rosemary, and mint are good for preparing express sauces for white fish meat. You can safely experiment with basil, marjoram and oregano. Garlic lovers can add it to any base. The spicy, hot vegetable is good in sour cream, tomato, and creamy sauce.
- The crispy crust gives fish cutlets a special charm. To preserve it, do not pour gravy over the dish. It is better to serve it in a separate gravy boat, from which you can add a little to the plate. Another option is to pour a little into the bottom of the serving plate and arrange the meatballs. Then they will become soft on the bottom and retain a crust on top.
A recipe with a story
First, I’ll tell you the story of how I discovered this sauce.
One morning I woke up with a feeling of terrible hunger. The refrigerator is full, but you don't want anything that's in there. I think many people know this feeling.
It was decided to go to an Irish pub, where there is a lot of delicious beer and good food. There were three of us: me, my husband and his brother.
It was just after the wedding: you were feeling strange, and you didn’t know what you wanted more: food or cold ale. After the first sip of Guinness, I grabbed the menu, and the first thing my eye fell on was pike cutlets. I remembered that people really praise such cutlets; I had read recipes more than once and knew that lard was added to make them juicy and served with mashed potatoes and sauce.
It was the first time in my life that I ate pike cutlets.
At the sight of the dish, saliva fell to the floor... Two ruddy cutlets lying aesthetically on the sauce, and two neat balls of mashed potatoes... Upon contact with the fork, the cutlets ejaculated with melted butter. The consistency of the cutlets was tender and crumbly. Boiled cauliflower, broccoli and carrots, which I hated, went together perfectly.
I devoured these cutlets in two minutes. Two minutes of bliss. Delicious is an understatement.
And immediately a recipe is brewing in my mind to cook it at home. I have no doubt about the cutlets: pike, lard, onions, bread and milk. I also saw particles of dill in pub cutlets.
But the sauce... Amazing, I’ve never tried anything like this. I knew that pike was served with mushroom sauce, and it tasted like mushroom, but there was something green in it. Parsley? Dill? In addition, it was slightly yellowish. The men were already starting to have brilliant ideas about the recipe, including “the cook has sinusitis gygygy.”
My husband and brother had already had a good drink of Guinness, and I was still trying to figure out what the sauce consisted of.
We asked the waiter and received the answer “this is the secret of the establishment” and a sweet smile. To which my husband’s brother cheerfully said, “And if we cut off our fingers, it’s still a secret hehe?” The waiter promised to find out and left.
We drank more, were about to leave, and I was sad (because of the sauce). My brother ordered more whiskey, and with the phrase “haven’t they given you the recipe yet???” walked with a special boyish gait towards the bartender. I no longer hoped for anything. Secret. And just as I was leaving the pub, the waiter came up to me and said: “Remember. Broccoli, cream, green onions, capers. And definitely turmeric" Apparently, the husband’s brother finally agreed, and there was no need to cut off his fingers.
Like a mantra, I begin to repeat these cherished words after him. I remember))
Well, naturally, at the earliest opportunity, I’m trying to reproduce this sauce.
First, I made cutlets according to Polkovneg’s recipe.
Bought pike, after asking the seller to show me the gills and let me smell them. It turned out to be the freshest. 
I ran the fillet through a meat grinder. 
added fried onions, bread (soaked in cream), salt and pepper.
Breaded in breadcrumbs
Maybe I made great cutlets, even perfect ones. Really delicious. However, not like in a pub! There the cutlet falls apart into microparticles and splatters with oil, but mine is elastic. I tried cooking with lard - it was also very tasty, but not the same. Moreover, both at Hulinar and at Sal, the cutlets are exactly the same as in the pub. But I can't do it.
So, my friends. Who else will give you an idea on how to cook a perfectly juicy, crumbly pike cutlet? It seems that raw minced meat and heat-treated fish are mixed there... Or even minced meat from fully cooked fish.
Well, don’t scroll twice. Still, the consistency is very elastic, I added enough bread and cream. I didn't lay an egg. I also noticed that in the pub the bottom of the cutlet is pale: most likely they are cooked in the oven. Possibly under the grill. I think next time I'll put a piece of butter in the middle...
The word “butter” strikes me. Imagine the situation: I’m typing this text, asking you what else to add, and then an inner voice says to me: “Baby, are you stupid? You yourself wrote that the cutlet “splashes with oil,” at the beginning it even “ejaculated with melted butter.” So what should we add? Right! Butter!". Okay, still delicious. When I’m in the mood to fillet another pike, I’ll make it according to a different recipe.
Now the sauce. The only problem is that I don’t know how best to prepare it. I did it my way. Maybe someone will have a better idea.
So, the secret sauce (all by eye):
Cream
Broccoli
Capers
Green onions
Turmeric
Salt pepper
Pike, in itself, is a rather specific fish. Its meat is tasty, but has a number of disadvantages: it is somewhat dry, has many small bones and smells of river mud. However, knowing some secrets and nuances, you can prepare an amazing dish from it that will not leave any member of your family indifferent. So, we present to your attention pike cutlets. Recipe with photos step by step.
Pike, like any other fish, can be prepared in different ways. Fry, boil, bake or even stuff. But the most popular dish is cutlets. Since they allow you to eliminate all the disadvantages of this fish described above. Let's look at this in a little more detail:
- Excessive dryness of pike meat can be easily compensated for by adding fresh or fried onions, minced pork or lard to the minced meat. Various sauces and gravies will also solve this problem and make the taste of the dish more expressive.
- Serving pike in the form of cutlets will allow you to enjoy its taste without poking around in the dish looking for bones. After all, when cutting fish into fillets, all visible large bones are removed, and the remaining small ones are ground in a meat grinder and softened during further heat treatment.
- The specific fishy smell is significantly reduced by adding lard, onions, carrots, spices, fresh herbs (dill, parsley) to the minced meat, as well as by frying cutlets breaded with breadcrumbs, eggs and cheese.
But in order to ensure that your efforts are not wasted, you need to pay special attention to one point, on which the result will directly depend. This is the freshness of the fish. If you just caught it yourself, then, of course, there are no questions. But if you decide to buy pike in a store or market, and they don’t have live pike in their assortment, then to choose the right carcass you should know some nuances:
- Fresh pike's eyes are transparent and bulging. When the fish lies for a long time, they become sunken and cloudy.
- Gray or blackened gills are a clear sign of stale fish. On fresh, ungutted pike they are red. Gutted ones are a little lighter, to pale pink.
- Pay attention to the scales. If it is shiny and smooth, it means that the fish has not yet had time to weather.
- The abdomen should under no circumstances be swollen.
- The meat of fresh fish is elastic and quickly regains its shape when pressed.
Pike, of course, has its own specific smell, but it is the smell of river mud and nothing else! A sharp, unpleasant odor should definitely alert you.
Cutlets with cucumber sauce
Pike cutlets prepared according to this recipe with photos and step-by-step descriptions turn out airy, juicy, and tender. And the original pickled cucumber sauce gives the dish a brighter and more expressive taste.
Ingredients
- medium-sized pike – 1 pc.;
- onions – 2 pcs.;
- egg – 1 pc.;
- flour and breadcrumbs - 50 g each;
- sour cream – 50 gr.;
- pickled cucumber – 2-3 pcs.;
- water – ½ cup;
- salt and spices;
- fresh herbs (dill, parsley);
- oil for frying.
How to cook pike cutlets
- First of all, the pike must be scaled, gutted and washed thoroughly. Cut off the head and fins.
- Then use a sharp knife to cut the carcass lengthwise, remove the backbone and visible large bones. You don’t have to remove the skin, as you prefer.
- Now we pass the fillet through a meat grinder. If the fish is large, then it is better to turn the meat twice, since its internal bones are thicker than those of a young small fish.
- Add onion (1 head). You can also grind it through a meat grinder, or you can simply chop it finely. Some housewives recommend pre-frying the onions. This will reduce the fishy smell of the cutlets and give them an interesting flavor.
- Drive an egg into the resulting minced meat, add salt and pepper, add your favorite spices and fresh herbs if desired.
- Bread the formed cutlets in flour or breadcrumbs and fry on both sides in a well-heated frying pan until cooked.
- To prevent the oil from foaming during frying, you need to add a little salt to it. Just don’t overdo it, remember that we have already salted the minced cutlets.
- Transfer the finished cutlets to another bowl.
- Cut the onion into half rings and the cucumbers finely.
- In the same frying pan where the pike cutlets were fried, without changing the oil, first fry the onion.
- And then also finely chopped pickles.
- We empty the frying pan, return the cutlets to it, and top them with cucumbers and onions.
- In a separate bowl, mix sour cream, water, spices and herbs.
- Pour this mixture over our cutlets. Cover with a lid and simmer at low temperature for half an hour.
- To prevent sour cream from curdling during stewing, experienced housewives recommend mixing it with a small amount of milk.
It is better to serve pike cutlets hot with gravy, garnished with fresh vegetables and herbs. Rice or potatoes are great as a side dish.
Pike cutlets in the oven
The main secret of this recipe is that pike cutlets are baked under a top of tomato and cheese. This gives them juiciness, softness and originality. With the help of a detailed description and step-by-step photos, you can prepare a very tasty and presentable dish that will rightfully take its place not only on the everyday, but also on the festive table.
Ingredients
- pike fillet – 0.5 kg;
- onion – 1 pc.;
- egg – 1 pc.;
- tomatoes – 3 pcs.
- cheese – 100 gr.;
- salt and spices.
Preparation
You can serve them as an independent dish, garnished with herbs. Or with a side dish of fresh and baked vegetables. Mashed potatoes or rice are also great as a side dish. Pike cutlets have proven themselves not only as a hot dish, but also as a cold appetizer. 
By the way, you can prepare such a dish from any non-fatty fish, for example, hake or pike perch.
Tasty, juicy, beautiful - pike cutlets are sure to become the decoration of your table and will not leave any guest indifferent. Become a culinary guru. Cook according to our recipes with detailed step-by-step descriptions and colorful photos. Delight your loved ones with delicious and interesting dishes.
No fresh fish? Prepare delicious ones.
Hooray! My husband brought pike from fishing; it’s been a while since he spoiled us with this tasty dietary fish. How to cook pike is not a question for me, you can prepare different dishes, but I decided to make fish cutlets from pike, the recipe for which I offer you, and it’s very tasty, believe me.
If you think that pike meat is a little dry for cutlets, then there are little tricks that will make pike fish cutlets tender and juicy.
Pike fish cutlet recipe
If for some reason you have previously ignored pike, then I strongly recommend turning your attention to this fish and starting to get to know it with pike. Because it is not only very tasty, but also healthy.
- Pike meat is compared to chicken meat because it contains easily digestible protein.
- The content of vitamins and minerals makes pike meat a good preventative against colds and viral diseases.
- This is a low-calorie product, so pike is recommended for dietary nutrition.
Convinced? Let's cook.
Recipe for pike fish cutlets with lard
I most often make cutlets with lard, we really like them. Someone will say that I just talked about the value of pike as a dietary product, and then suddenly we add a fairly high-calorie product - lard. Firstly, we won’t add much of it, and secondly, lard is also a healthy product. For example, arachidonic acid, which is part of it, which removes bad cholesterol from our body. Lard also gives the cutlets that same tenderness and juiciness that I mentioned above.
Ingredients:
- pike fillet - 1 kg.
- fresh lard - 150 gr.
- onions - 2 - 3 pcs.
- eggs - 2 pcs.
- white loaf - 2 slices
- milk - 1/2 cup
- ground pepper, salt to taste, pinch of sugar
- vegetable oil for frying
Pike fish cutlets - step-by-step recipe with photos
As a side dish for pike fish cutlets, you can serve boiled potatoes, rice or vegetable salads, for example.
Other recipes for making pike fish cutlets
Or rather, these are not different recipes, because the main ingredients will remain the same, only some of them change and you can cook not only in a frying pan.
- You can replace the lard with a piece of butter - first fry the onions in it and add it to the minced meat.
- If you want a lean version of cutlets, replace the eggs with 1 tbsp. l. heaping amount of starch, and lard with 0.5 cups of vegetable oil - in this version the cutlets also turn out delicious.
- If you don’t like fried food, you can steam pike fish cutlets or bake them in the oven, but in this case you don’t need to coat them in breading.
- Cheese lovers will love tender and tasty cutlets with cheese - make a flatbread from minced fish, put a piece of cheese or grated cheese in the middle, form a cutlet, roll in semolina and fry.
- I haven’t tried these options, but I know what cutlets do with carrots - they add raw carrots grated on a coarse grater to the minced meat. Another option is to add finely chopped parsley to the minced meat.
If you haven’t made such cutlets yet, then I strongly recommend adding the recipe for pike fish cutlets to your family recipe box. I really hope that they will become a frequent guest on your table, because as I already said, this is both a healthy and very tasty dish.
P.S. If the pike are not large, then they are good not only in cutlets, they can simply be fried, or they can be cooked in the oven, for example, according to the recipe, replacing the perch with pike.
Bon appetit!
Elena Kasatova. See you by the fireplace.
