Recently the people on the Scunthorpe Telegraph newspaper and website were asked to name their favourite Chip Shop in the area.

I did this myself, voting for Excel Fisheries on Rowland Road, Scunthorpe. It’s a great chippy and I have been going there for the best part of 20 years. It has improved by quite a margin since the owner took a back seat to pursue other interests, leaving his misses to do the cooking. Good move in my opinion because even though the chips are OK when he cooks, she actually puts a bit of colour in them!

Anyway, the good people of Scunny voted and a chippy of which I have not frequented was a clear winner…

Newland Fryer, Newland Ave, Scunthorpe.

There were a couple of chippies mentioned that I have had the pleasure/displeasure to eat their offerings. The one at Messingham which is good if a little shy with the chips – you need two portions if you’re hungry. Carvers which is shit but immensely popular and Harry’s on Frodingham road, Good, and now the goto chippy in that area since Wilsons (a few years ago the best chippy in town) was shut for Health grounds – Rats and their droppings, enough said.

So, hungry, off I went to Newland Ave and waited in line for my portion of Haddock, Chips and Peas. The off back home for the feast.

Oh how the people of this fine town are wrong. So wrong they are Wrongy McWrong from Wrong town on national lets not be Right day.

On opening the bag the paper was wet with grease. OK you get a bit of this in pretty much any chippy, but the paper was especially wet. Not a good start.

The fish was small. I know catches in the North Sea and Atlantic are declining but the Haddock is a massive fish. If I had gone in and asked for Stickleback I would have been happy with the size. OK so it was small, I have had smaller, but it was tasteless. Flaky white meat held a promise the poor fish that gave it’s life for this moment couldn’t live up to. Sometimes a tasteless fish is saved but the batter it’s clothed in. Not this time, again tasteless. It must be the fat they cook in as you can’t really mess up the recipe for batter. Flour, Salt and water. Maybe the salt police got to them and they missed that out. I don’t know. All I know is the finished product, sat swimming in it’s own pool of grease, tasted less than the paper it was wrapped in.

The peas didn’t taste of bugger all either. As you can see from the picture above, they had plenty of that bright green colour we have come to love and expect from chippy peas, just no flavour.

Now the chips…

What is it that a triumvirate of foodstuffs – Fish, Potato, Pea – can simultaneously look reasonably fine, if a little shiny, be so uninspiring and bland? They were firm and visually cooked to a nice crisp outer. Surprisingly the inner wasn’t mushy like the chips from Carvers. But, and I am beginning to sound like a broken record here, tasteless.

A few hours after the disappointing meal I still had a greasy mouth texture and had to go clean my teeth. Also felt a little queasy, although this could be attributed to the large amount of Fanta drunk to rid me of the foul after affects.

I didn’t finish the meal. Which if you know me you know I can’t abide wasted food.

Verdict

Fish: 4/10 – Chips: 4/10 – Peas 3/10

Recommend? No, go somewhere else.

Is it me? I love fried eggs, but I’m particular in the way they are cooked but more so in the way they are consumed.

The best way, for me at least, to cook an egg to perfection is a three point plan.

• Point 1: Don’t have the oil – or to be really great, lard – too hot. It makes the white bubble, not good, and produces that brown crap around the edge and underneath, also not good. A perfect fried egg’s white should be just that, white.
• Point 2: Don’t, I repeat Don’t, ever, and I mean it, pop the yolk whilst cracking the egg into the pan. Ever.
• Point 3: Flick not flip. Flick the oil/lard over the yolk. Don’t flip the egg – this could produce the nightmare situation of yolk sack breakage. Too horrible to contemplate.

We have the perfectly cooked chicken ovum on our plate. Time to eat the treat. Now I have been called weird and strange – on more than one occasion, and to be honest on many a subject * – but I eat my eggs in a regimented and structured way.

First off, I cut the white off, using straight cuts with the knife. So as the yolk and a little white is left. Then I eat the rest of the breakfast or dinner. It has to be stated here and now that a ‘Full English Breakfast’ is the daddy of all meals, and a personal favourite.

Then, once the meal has been consumed. The Yolk. Slip it onto the fork with care and attention, mustn’t break that delicate membrane keeping all that yellowy goodness intact. One fluid motion and it’s in the pie-hole. Slowly break the seal with the tongue, and let the flavour flood out into the mouth and then I take my time to savour that flavour, for it is a fleeting pleasure. And remember, there is nothing more heart breaking than egg-yolk on porcelain.

And there we have it, the perfect fried egg experience. I have been eating eggs this way for as long as I can remember and today at work, a kindred spirit arose from the mire of philistine yolk breakers. Brian, a gentleman of advancing years revealed his credo of egg consumption. Exactly as above described.

I am not alone.

( * buttered Weetabix anyone? )