British style chips with vinegar?

Cafe Society
1

Ok so I developed a love of vinegar and salt flavored potato chips, which seem to be being slowly discontinued :frowning: as the number of groceries that carry them is dwindling.

It got me curious about the British custom of putting vinegar on your chips(french fries) and I tried very lightly sprinkling some white 5% vinegar on some steaming hot french fries. Not bad but no matter how light I am on the sprinkling they do get soggy, too light and I can’t even taste a difference.

What are Brits calling chips with vinegar? Am I doing this wrong?

2

White vinegar be damned - you should be using malt vinegar.

3

This looks timely:
Vinegar or salt on chips? How about vinegar salt

4

The practise around here is to dip the fish in vinegar or put a drop on at a time just before you bite if you’re holding the whole piece.

TriPolar - Professional fish slinger - Possibly related to the originator of Fish and Chips.

5

Malt vinegar (as mentioned).
British “chips” are generally thicker. “Steak fries”? Is that right?

I actually put quite a lot on, as with a thicker chip they don’t get soggy.

6

Sort of. The term has regional variations.

7
  1. Malt vinegar, and salt
  2. Chunky chips about half an inch thick minimum, not thin fries
  3. A little sogginess isn’t a bad thing.
8

I think that another subtle difference is that the chips that you buy in British chip shops tend to be slightly more greasy, and so absorb less of the vinegar…

9

They don’t seem to be hard to find here. There must have been at least four different brands represented at my grocery store the other day, and at the gas 'n go I had a hard time finding plain potato chips, there were so many salt and vinegar and other flavors!

That said, I’ll repeat what others have said…Malt Vinegar. If you want to be sure before you invest in a bottle, get some with your fries at any Charley’s at the mall, or Arthur Treacher’s/Nathan’s, or Mr. Hero…they’ve had it for years with their waffle fries.

10

There’s the malt vinegar thing others have mentioned. Also you said you “lightly sprinkled” the fries with vinegar. Roockie mistake, there.

You need to hose them down with vinegar, then apply a healthy coating of salt. Yes it makes them soggy. Soggy with deliciousness. British fries are usually not cooked that crispy anyway.

11

Canadians use white vinegar – that’s what you would get if you asked for vinegar at McDonalds.

As noted above, yes, they get soggy and if you can’t taste it, you’re not using enough.

12

Hose them down, and re-apply as necessary–I often find that the vinegar absconds while I’m eating my fries, requiring several doses (and leading to a giant puddle of vinegar at the end, with delicious, soggy vinegar-soaked fries floating about).

13

No, no. Salt first, then vinegar. The oil on the chips will repel the vinegar, but if you put the salt on first, it will cling to the grease, and then absorb the vinegar.

14

Yeah, to repeat everyone else - you have to use malt vinegar, and the chips don’t resemble french fries. They’re about 4 times as thick.

15

Well, then that’s not British style fish and chips, then, is it? :smiley:

16

Fair enough. :slight_smile:

17

malt vinegar on fish and chips/fries is all well and good. I never found any vinegar-style potato chips I could stand because they all had way too much salt on them. I mean, if my lips are burning from the salt, there’s too damn much.

18

Well I say the salt bounces off unless the chips are wet with vinegar.

Pistols at dawn, sir!

19

reported

20

I used to work in a chippie and I used to vinegar before salt.

Ergo I am right, as is Hello Again.

QED.