THE UNEXPECTED CHIP

M’colleague had to pop out at lunchtime a few weeks ago. This could, of course, have been for any number of reasons. Errands to run, things to buy, you name it, that’s generally what lunchtimes are for. It’s only light-averse sad sacks like myself who tend to remain glued to our ever-so squeaky office chairs during that hour of potential freedom and who prefer to munch away moodily on the sandwiches that we’ve brought from home.

My God, you can so easily start to get sick of cheese rolls.

Granted, I’ve really only got myself to blame for any of the lack of variety in my lunch carrying receptacle, because it’s largely down to me to prepare it in the darkness of the early morning, and once I’ve thrown the usual unhealthy selection into it (the kind of things that would never pass the average school packed lunch inspection squadrons), the whole sandwich creation routine largely depends upon what I can find in the fridge.

Whilst occasionally I have been known to be prepared enough to have actually purchased a selection of sandwich fillings, the default position is usually cheddar with optional pickle, or else in emergencies I will reach for the peanut butter jar (another ingredient that would be banished from the approved school luncheon list) and so I usually find myself quietly and monotonously chewing upon a rather disappointing and bland sandwich option towards the middle of my working day.

Anyway, M’coll duly returned from whatever errands needed doing and was brandishing a wrapped paper parcel that could only have come from the local chippy. Copious apologies were immediately forthcoming for “stinking the place out” but I really didn’t mind, although the beautiful aroma of an unexpected bag of chips is almost guaranteed to get my tastebuds tingling and make my sad little sandwiches suddenly seem even duller, if that were at all possible.

The Unexpected Chip
Accept no imitations

As ever, the portion bought was huge and so this delightful tasty treat was offered to the room to share and, rather happily, I found myself grabbing just a couple of that rare but wonderful phenomenon: The Unexpected Chip.

Why is it that they always taste that much better when you come upon them unawares, or when they belong to someone else? So many times over the years I’ve bought a bag of chips on the way home from the pub and found that I’ve had to let a substantial amount go to waste. There is a fundamental phenomenon that your own chips are often far too much, but someone else’s seem perfectly desirable no matter how full you are. Nowadays, if we do decide to go for the “chippy tea” option, it’s perfectly normal for us to get a portion of fish and chips to share and for us both to be brimful after the fact.

Maybe that loaves and fishes thing wasn’t quite such a miracle as we thought it was if they were dealing with chip shop portions…?

I am seriously of the opinion that the only chips that you ever really like are the ones nearest to where you grew up. I’ve tried to enjoy chips in London but always found them disappointing, and the less said about the ones that we used to buy when I was a student the better. For me, the only way that I ever really knew that I was really home was the taste of that first bag of chips after I’d been for a couple of drinks with my pals, with that splash of vinegar and that deadly salt combining with those perfectly fried potatoes to make my mouth water and truly transport me to my obscure happy place.

I was always up for a bit of a meat and potato pie with them, too. Again, the only ones that ever really worked for me were the Hollands variety. I guess that it’s another of those bizarre geographic phenomenon, because I never found a chip shop pie that I enjoyed quite as much as those in any other part of the country. I suppose it’s very much like what they say about drinking a pint of Guinness, in that you’ve never truly tasted it until you’ve drunk a glass in Ireland, and I do feel much the same way about my local chippy.

M’coll, of course, was investigating the nearest one to our shiny new office, and it was an exploration that very much needed to be done as discovering where the local chippy is, and how good its product is, is one of the first duties needing to be done after any relocation. On my current sampling of the two chips that I was able to snaffle, I suspect that it’s far too early to judge the quality of this one yet.

Further enquiries may have to be made.

After all, I do have a slight reputation for such things as I did once instigate the phenomenon of “Chippy Day” at one of the offices I once worked in, mostly because one day a week I had family duties that kept me out late and it was the only way I could guarantee a decent hot meal on that day of the week, unless I ended up eating at midnight, which is seldom the wisest thing to do.

Unless you’re on the way home from the pub of course…