Is there a particular flavor (or FLAVOUR) of chemical they are using that they shouldn’t be?
Tartare sauce is just mayonnaise, gherkins and capers. All nice things and if the sauce is properly prepared (which it often is not), it’s a good thing.
Balsamic vinegar? I’ll take that if it’s a restaurant presentation of fish and chips where the chips are extraordinarily cuboid and stacked into a little hut, but malt vinegar (and a little too much salt) is where it’s at for fish and chips eaten out of paper.
White vinegar always seems a little industrial to me. (Which, BTW, is what I think people mean when they say ‘chemical’).
For basic F&C, Griffs on the dock in Port Orford is the place to go.
If I can’t get malt, I’ll settle for red wine vinegar, but that’s it.
Yeah - meh sulphate
in the 70’s and 80’s the most common fish used for Fish and Chips in New Zealand and Australia was shark (called flake or dog fish or lemon fish). Mostly by-catch, which made it cheap.
These days (in NZ), it is now mostly hoki, tarakihi, snapper or orange roughy (depending on what you want to pay).
I do miss flake, though - but it could just be a hankering back to my childhood.
This has been a great thread, but by tomorrow it’ll stink.
well, when both of those people show up, they can make the point.
That’s probably because in the UK these days Halibut is one of the most expensive fish you can buy, right up there with dover sole. Now more Michelin-starred than chippie staple, sadly.
I may have mentioned this before, but recently the canteen in the building where I work advertised a lunch special of ‘English-style fish and chips’. Not having had any in quite a while, I was seriously jonesing, so I duly ordered up a batch. Here’s what I got:
Tilapia
Breaded, not battered
The chips were, well, potato chips.
No sign of malt vinegar or tartar sauce.
It’s been months and I’m still sulking.
If I had a couple days free and money to spare, I’d be heading off to St John’s, NF for my F & C fix. They know how to make it there.
Halibut is expensive here, too. And they’re native to the area.
Fried in beef dripping , or veg oil ?
I’ve got the feeling veg oil is giving me a sore mouth.
I like some haddock or cod-based fish and chips with malt vinegar and salt. I’ll skip the mushy peas though; if I hadn’t seen British people eating them, I’d have assumed they were some kind of joke you guys pull on the American guy.
Fried catfish and french fries are also good, but not “fish and chips” as such. They’re kind of weird with malt vinegar and salt, but are just fine with tartar sauce and ketchup. I do like some malt vinegar and hushpuppies though…
I’ve never had more than a mouthful of mushy peas, they look like something that comes out more than something that goes in.
Mushy peas is essentially just marrowfat peas made into a thick soup. I don’t understand why the dish provokes such a strong reaction in some people - maybe they don’t like eating green things?
It’s essentially the British version of hoummous or dahl.
Oh, I know what they are. I just don’t much care for English peas (garden peas, in the UK, I think), or any variant thereof, especially if mashed into a mealy, starchy, lumpy, bland paste. I kind of doubt they’d be a popular side dish in much of the US either… not without significant amounts of ham or other flavoring agents.
So not actually a joke played against Americans then? Glad that’s cleared up.
Sugar?
There’s a place in Astoria (Oregon) called the Bowpicker (IIRC) that makes fish and chips with albacore tuna. :eek:
It’s actually pretty good.
Now I want me some fish n chips.
This thread left me with a major jones for fish & chips, so I just headed up to the afore-mentioned soul food restaurant and picked up a batch to go. $13.99 gets youthree pieces of battered halibut, a pile of fries, two hushpuppies, a cup of coleslaw, fresh lemon for squeezin’, malt vinegar, and all the delicious house-made extra-dill tartar sauce that you could ever want.
I am now a very happy man.