British Fish and Chips

British fish and chips consist of deep fried battered fish that is served with sliced deep-fried potatoes. There are different styles of this take-away dish depending on where you are in Britain.

Deep fried chips are an old staple;  they were even mentioned in the Charles Dickens novel about the French Revolution called “A Tale of Two Cities: published in 1859.   He described them as husky chips of potatoes fried with some reluctant drops of oil.

In most parts of the U.K. the fish and chip shop is called the “chippy” or “chipper”.  The early shops had a big kettle of cooking fat heated by coals.   During World War II it was one of the few common foods in the U.K. that was not rationed, possibly because it was so disgusting and the fish was an endless source of cheap fish.

The very first chipper stood on the present site of a place called Oldaham’s Tommyfield market in London in 1860. The first upscale restaurants in Britain that the working class could afford to go to started appearing in the 1890s and served fish and chips, bread and butter and tea.  It wasn’t until much later, during the 20s and 30s that you began to see smaller take-out shops delivering this meal wrapped in left over newspapers to soak up the grease.

Traditionally the chips and fish are fried in beef drippings or lard but nowadays you are more likely to find the fish fried in peanut oil. If you want to find old fashioned fish and chips they still fry everything in lard in Northern Ireland.

British chips are usually a lot thicker than American style.  The flat slabs of potato are called steak fries or beef fries in North America. The batter on the fish is usually made of water, flour, a little baking soda and a bit of vinegar.  U.K. recipes also call for milk or beer to give a light crispy texture to the batter.  Stout or bitters gives the fish which is usually cod or haddock a rich flavour.   White fish is also served including Pollock, coley, skate, ray and rock salmon.  Some places also sell small battered clumps of compressed cod roe as a snack to go with the chips.

In Edinburgh a specialty was fish and chips served with Gold Star sauce which is a combination of water and malt vinegar. Chippy sauce as it is known is still popular today.