As late as the 1980s, it was not unusual to come across older people bemused by the idea of rectilinear breaded seafood. “Who ever saw a fish with fingers?” your grandad might scoff. Not because he was a foodie (no one was in 1986) but simply because he could remember a time when food did not come pre-packed, frozen and reshaped so that it bore no visual resemblance to its animal origin.
Grandad was fighting a losing battle. Thirty years on, in this supposed nation of food lovers, fish fingers remain wildly popular. Sales have wobbled in recent years, but we eat more than 1.5m fish fingers a day and, according to market behemoth Birds Eye, 75% of us first taste fish in the form of fish fingers.
Fish fingers were once things you grew out of but that is no longer true. This 4am fallback for drunk students is now a staple on pub menus – gussied-up with handmade goujons and tartare sauce, perhaps, but nonetheless testament to the fact that for all their relative blandness (“No bones, no waste, no smell, no fuss,” was Birds Eye’s launch strapline), these crispy cod pieces are – particularly when slapped between two slices of bread – an enduring balm for the soul.
Not that making a good fish-finger butty at home is easy. You may think that industrial production (introduced to the UK in the 1950s by US frozen-foods pioneer Clarence Birdseye) would produce a uniform fish finger. But no. At every stage, from the fish itself (usually cut from huge frozen blocks of whole fillets) to the “enrobing” (the technical term for covering fish in batter and breadcrumbs), numerous tiny details have an impact on quality.
Which of the supermarket brands are a catch? Which should you throw back? And where does Birds Eye rank these days?
Birds Eye, 12 cod fish fingers, 336g, £2.50
Has Captain Birdseye been hammering the rum? Because for all the packaging’s rhetorical zeal (“Happy families guaranteed”) and its trumpeting of cod’s health benefits, these rather withered-looking fingers fail to dazzle. A mere 8.5cm by 2.5cm – ie basic, primary-school size – their crumb packs a decent, satisfyingly dry crunch, but the meagre cod within (58% of the contents, where most contain 60%) lacks any real solidity and heft. Mostly, it melts away toothlessly; a sweet, slippery, shy presence. On a sandwich, these become an anonymous mush.
4/10
Aldi, Northern Catch 10 cod fish fingers, 300g, £1.19
Like Birds Eye’s, these standard-size fingers are made from Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) approved sustainable cod, which is one of the few positives to report. The fish filling looks apologetically thin (58% of the whole, roughly 7mm thick), and the orange crumb is uneven. Intermittently, it offers an adequate crispiness; elsewhere the texture of worn carpet. Beneath that, you will find a gloopy underlay of undercooked batter, coating that sliver of squishy, textureless fish. The dominant flavours are breadcrumbs and tired cooking oil.
2/10
Waitrose, Frozen 6 MSC line-caught chunky breaded cod fingers, 400g, £3.25
Fatter fingers, these (12.5cm by 3.5cm), they are as attractively tanned as a Costa expat. The notably peppery shells are audibly crisp and they (albeit, not as comprehensively as they could be) are filled with a creditably thick layer of robustly textured fillet fish. The problem, however, is gunk: in many places lie millimetres of wet batter, sitting like grey putty under the breadcrumbs, which fundamentally undermines that crunch. You would eat these without complaint, but with no great enthusiasm.
6/10
Tesco, Finest 6 chunky cod fillet fish fingers, 400g, £2.50
“Like eating bland jelly”, “so mushy it’s like they’re filled with wet tissue”, “eerily insubstantial” read my tasting notes. While big (13cm by 3cm), these fingers fail on virtually all fronts. You get the occasional meatier, tastier mouthful (and there is some haphazard crunch in the crumb) but generally these pale fingers are a trudge of damp, woolly fish swaddled in sticky batter, the crumb only loosely adhered to the fish; more blanket than tight coating. A casual two fingers to the consumer.
4/10
M&S, 9 chunky breaded cod fish fingers, 360g, £2
But for their notable 2cm thickness, these look like kids’ stuff: standard length, golden orange in colour, the coating offering little resistance as you put your fork through it. Chew on, however, and you will find the well-seasoned breadcrumb offers a light, brief residual crunch and a reasonable flavour (albeit one more “fried” than savoury). The (in parts, slightly waterlogged) fish delivers a toothsome, meaty texture and a clear sweetness. Crucially, there is little if any batter residue under the crumb. Overall, not bad.
7/10
Co-Op, Ultimate fish fingers 6, 380g, £3.29
A curiosity, these 4cm-wide, MSC-approved fingers are sold fresh not frozen for oven-baking not grilling. The first batch tasted worthy and bland (they need more of the listed salt and cider vinegar), and they required a blast under the grill to strengthen the eventually impressively crackling, crunchy crumb. A significant layer of moist, floury batter under that (still flavourless) crumb undermines it, however. The two combine to produce an overly thick coating for fish that, while sporadically sound, was often mealy and lacking muscular density.
5/10
Asda, 30 cod fillet fish fingers, 900g, £4
Boasting the fish finger’s classic fake tan-orange hue, Asda’s (toothless, gummy) offering will sate ravenous kids, but that is all they are good for. The coating (more a baggy jacket) is gritty if not unpleasantly so, but offers no crisp definition at first bite and, yet again, hides an almost gelatinous substratum of icky batter. The 64% cod content seems generous, until you taste it. It is classic frozen cod: mushy, flavourless, fibrous, chewy. Make a sandwich with these and it would be claggy chore.
3/10
Sainsbury’s, Taste the Difference 8 chunky cod fish fingers, 480g, £3
These swollen fingers (9cm by 4cm) are not immune to the problems outlined above. There is some glop under the crumb (giving them a slight gluey edge) and the MSC-approved fish, while persuasively meaty for once, could hardly be said to taste vibrantly of cod. However, with their stand-out 70% cod content and their remarkably flavoursome, stridently crunchy crumb (nicely browned, deeply savoury, sparky with vinegar and pepper), these are, by far, the best in this test. These fingers get a thumbs-up.
8/10
