A Brief History

• Fried fish began in working-class London at the beginning of Queen Victoria’s reign, selling the leftovers from Billingsgate fish market. Fried ‘chipped’ potatoes appeared in Lancashire around the 1860s. The two were served together somewhere around 1870.

• Charles Dickens mentioned fish and chips in Oliver Twist and F Volent and J R Warren in their Memoirs of Alexis Soyer (1859) described Soyer buying fried fish and eating it as he walked through Soho.

• In 1845 vinegar was first recommended to be splashed over fish and chips by Victorian cook, Eliza Acton, as a means of sweetening the fish.

• Joseph Malin opened the first fish and chip shop in Cleveland Street, London in the 1860s.

• In 1906 in Lancashire, Theodore Clegg opened a 70-seater fish and chip restaurant and divided his customers into three classes –first, second and third according to their personal appearance and social status.

• In 1910 there were roughly 25,000 fish and chip shops across the country, and in 1927 there were about 35,000! Today there are around 11,500.

• In 1940 fish and chips was the only ‘restaurant’ food not to be rationed during the Second World War. Frederick Lord Woolton, the Minister of Food, even allowed mobile frying vans to carry fish and chips to evacuees around the country.

Health Aspects

Isn’t fish & chips bad for your health?
It’s a natural, nutritional meal which is good value for money and an excellent source of protein - better than most fast foods.   It provides the body with carbohydrate, vitamins B6 and B12, vitamin C, iron, calcium, phosphorous, as well as the trace elements iodine, fluorine, zinc and some dietary fibre.

Is fish and chips fattening?
Fish and chips is a wholesome, nutritious meal which contains less additives than other take-aways such as burgers and curries, and also contains a number of essential vitamins.

British Nutrition Foundation statistics show that an average portion of fish and chips contains almost three times less fat (20.6%) than an equivalent portion of chicken tikka masala and pilau rice.

As a freshly prepared “natural” product, fish and chips are fine as part of a balanced diet and should be eaten in moderation.

How much saturated fat is in an average portion?
The quick frying methods used today and the high quality oils used by most shops mean that very little oil gets into the fish.  The total fat content of an average portion of fish and chips is 48.2g. This compares favourably with a cheese and ham sandwich with mayonnaise which has 51.98g fat and a Donner Kebab in pitta bread with salad and chips which has a total fat content of 57.74g

Is fish & chips still the UK’s favourite take away meal?  More popular than curries?
Yes, Britain’s No1 take away with over 261 million meals eaten every year. 

How many calories are in the average portion of fish & chips?
861.95 calories in the average portion.

How does this compare with the daily recommended intake for men/women?
According to the British Nutrition Foundation, taking information from the UK Department of health, estimated average requirements (EAR), the breakdown for men and women is as follows:

• Men (aged between 19-50 years)  - 2,550 Kcal
• Women (aged between 19-50 years) – 1,940 Kcal

Fish Stocks/Sustainability

Cod is the most popular fish - what are your comments on dwindling cod stocks?
Cod is followed by haddock, whiting, huss and plaice.  Most of the cod we eat is NOT from the North Sea – in fact only a third of fish and chip shops use locally landed fish.  A number shops are also becoming more adventurous and selling more unusual fish suppers using huss, dover sole, hoki and pollock. 

Are sales of seafood in general declining?
Sales of seafood are increasing, so people are actually eating more seafood. It’s becoming one of the country’s most popular foods with spending on the up – rising steadily by around 6%. However, people are still consuming less than the recommended minimum weekly amount, and one of the purposes of the SuperHuman campaign is to address this. 

So where is most of the cod we eat from?
Imported mainly from the Barents Sea and Norwegian waters. And the cod that is landed in the UK is caught within existing strict management regimes. The control measures already in place at a European level to help preserve stocks the closure of certain fisheries during the spawning seasons; catch quotas and restrictions on the type of fishing gear, which can be used. So if you are a consumer you can be reassured that your fish has been caught within safe limits.