110. Chips

Now, it might seem odd that it has taken me 109 posts to get to chips, but potatoes and chips in particular are so entirely central to my life that it's taken me until now to think of it. For me, saying that I love chips is like saying that I love breathing. Or blinking.

For any Americans reading, I do not mean potato chips. I mean fries. But I mean English fries, which come in many shapes and sizes.

There is the chip shop chip. Salty, vinegary, the smaller ones crispy, the larger ones either fluffy or greasy depending on the quality of the chippy and the hotness of the fat. All chip shop chips are good if you are drunk or cold or both.

There is the standard issue pub chip. Salty, but more like a posh oven chip - uniformly crunchy on the outside, but might need help from either mayonnaise or Tom Ketch. Good, but could often be better.

There is the fast food fry. But I don't eat fast food any more so I haven't had one of these chips for years. I seem to remember that McDonalds did the best chips and Burger King did the best burgers. Is that still true? These are not really chips, obviously, but they would do at a pinch.

Then there is the posh restaurant fry. At Le Caprice, swanky London restaurant, you can choose between 'pommes allumettes' and summink else chippy. Get the matchsticks. The chips at Le Caprice rival those at the Wolseley, which rival those at the Ivy. But, in my humble and frighteningly untutored opinion, the best chips in London at the present time are to be found at Le Relais de Venise, on Marylebone Lane, W1. It helps, of course, that they accompany the best steak in London, which will be liberally supported by the most frustrating and delicious green sauce ever invented. The chips are thin, hot, salty, crunchy, fluffy, light, substantial and best of all, you get two helpings of 'em.

I inherit the chip thing directly from six generations of Irish ancestors and, more particularly, from The Parent. She doesn't eat potatoes in any other form, I don't think, but every now and again, starting from a gentle rumble and building (if ignored) to a mighty shout, she will say 'Chips' and keep saying it until she is fed. Ignore her at your peril.