Fish fingers, known as fish sticks in North America, are a processed food made using a whitefish such as cod, haddock or pollock which have been battered or breaded.
They are commonly available in the frozen food section of supermarkets, and on children's menus in family-oriented restaurants. They can be baked in the oven, grilled, shallow fried, or deep-fried.
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In the United Kingdom in the 1930s, most of the herring catch was pickled and exported to other Northern European countries. In an attempt to make herring more appealing on the home market, companies tried to present it in a new way, creating herring fish fingers called “herring savouries” and were tested on the market against a bland control product of cod sticks, sold as “fish fingers.” Shoppers in Southampton and South Wales, where the test was conducted, confounded expectations by showing an overwhelming preference for the cod. Cod fish fingers were first produced in Great Yarmouth,[1] and introduced in Britain on 26 September 1955.
In 1953, the American company Gorton-Pew Fisheries, now known as Gorton's, was the first company to introduce a frozen ready-to-cook fish finger, named Gorton’s Fish Sticks, which won the Parents Magazine Seal of Approval.
The fish used may be either fillets cut to shape or minced/ground fish reformed to shape. Those made entirely from fillets are generally regarded as the higher quality products and will typically have a prominent sign on the box stating that the fish is 100% fillet. Minced fish is more commonly used in store brand economy products.
In addition to white fish, fish fingers are sometimes made with salmon. A commercially available variant of fish fingers is Omega 3 fish fingers, which are high in Omega 3.
In Doctor Who the Eleventh Doctor eats fish fingers dipped in custard after regenerating.