The Fish and Chip Shop - review

I booked The Fish and Chip Shop on Upper Street ages ago and had become more and more excited as time went on, as had the boys coming with me; two of the Chiswick lot, previously mentioned in these pages as...people I never mention.  When I asked them to choose pseudonyms for themselves, the first suggestions I received were 'Erotic Errol' and 'Legend aka I. Am'.  So they lost their voting rights and shall remain nameless.

In an effort to be cool (when in Rome Islington after all), I arranged to meet them for a few drinks at Slim Jim's, a rock and roll bar with bras on the ceiling.  I find this a bit sleazy.  There was a bar in Paris (directions available on request) where they put bras on the ceiling, but the waiters were topless and took the bras off the girls themselves, which made the whole thing a bit more tit for tat.  I can't imagine why you would go up to a fully dressed Axl Rose lookalike and hand him your bra but, then again, my idea of a good time is drinking too much indifferent Sauvignon Blanc and having an argument about apostrophes, so what do I know.

Anyway, I arrived to find one of my friends inside, downing a whisky. "Hullo", he said, and then, "let's go", which I thought was a little forward before we'd even eaten.  It turned out that our other friend was not there, having been refused entry.  For a brilliant moment, I thought he'd been turned away simply for being lame, which would have pretty much sorted our group out for conversation for the next ten years, but alas it was because he was wearing a suit.  I'm not sure a dress code is a particularly rock and roll thing to enforce, really. Wearing a suit doesn't automatically make you a jerk, nor does it reveal anything about what music you like.  It's a uniform as much as a policeman's clothes, or wearing a Metallica hoodie and having a ponytail when you're forty five years old.My friend, however, is a jerk, so they got it bang on with that one.

So there we were, a rebel without a cause, a rebel without a clue and yours truly, all dressed up (too smartly in some cases) with nowhere to go.  We killed some time in a pub and arrived early at the restaurant.  Despite our table not being ready, they kindly found us a perch (not on the menu, being a muddy river fish) and we ordered some cocktails.  These took quite a while to arrive but it was insanely busy and they'd given us a place (also not on the menu) to sit, so no complaints there.  We waited with baited breath.  Once moved to the comfier booth we were furnished with gimlets and an 'Old Man and the Sea' - "it tastes of watermelon", said my companion, sounding startled.  He was at once demonstrating a sensitive palate and the memory of a goldfish (again, not on the... I'll stop), as watermelon featured prominently in the drink's description on the menu.

The room looks 'traditional', but not like a traditional chippy at all.  Well, at least not like any of the ones near me.  If you're imagining strip lighting, peeling linoleum, formica and an obese man tossing scrag ends of fish into a stinking fryer whilst a desultory saveloy oversees an incidence of youth knife crime in the corner, you could not have got it more wrong.  It looks like a seaside pub, or maybe a ship.

The menu is short and sweet, and all fish.  You could do the whole thing without touching fish and chips themselves - there were good looking plates of grilled fish and vegetables and a shrimp mac 'n' cheese, which I forced myself not to order because all I want to eat is macaroni cheese all the bloody time, like some demented overgrown five year old.  AA Gill said it was good though.

We shared London particulars, three scallops with chilli and parsley butter, and crab on toast with avocados.  The scallops were delicious; butter slurped from the shells by two thirds of the company (the third was trying to keep his suit clean).  The London particulars are the 'famous' new thing - pea and ham croquettes with a mustard sauce.  Ham and pea soup is called a London particular after the fog of the same name (also pea souper...).  The croquettes were hot and crunchy and way better than soup.  Last was the crab - great quality meat, but a little dull compared to the other two.  I'm sure people said the same of our table.  One of my friends commented on the toast, but I can't remember what he said.

We had a bottle of their own blend wine, which was decent, and ordered cod and chips (me - classic, traditional), haddock and chips (friend 1, apparently northern), scampi and chips (friend 2, apparently from the 1970s) and two wallys (aside from my companions).  They're big gherkins, and you'll only need one.  Which I said eight times.  No matter, I'm about to lurch into the present tense and eat the best fish and chips of my life.  That good. The cod - flaky, pearlescent, perfectly cooked.  The batter - crisp, light, crunchy.  Absolutely excellent.  The boys said the same about theirs.  'Best chips in London' was bandied around.  The tartare sauce was zingy.

The only thing I would say is that I was extremely full.  I couldn't finish my food, which happens but rarely, and I was forced to call it a night before I was beached.