(I’ve started keeping a journal with the Day One iOS app, and though this defeats the purpose of a private record, I think I’ll post a few entries to the blog now and then. This is one of them.)


First takeaway from the new Smith’s Fish & Chips shop today; hard to process that this meal option is going to be a part of my life for the foreseeable future. They were doing great business with loads of churchgoers and a student sort of crowd dining in, although that’s to be expected from any new place with novel cuisine. Authentic British fish and chips is ridiculously hard to find, and Smith’s is thankfully high on the authenticity scale, alongside the Penny Black pub in Boat Quay. And with Balmoral Plaza they’ve picked one of the better locations to open up a second branch in Singapore. The English-men-with-Asian-wives category alone will keep them in business, to say nothing of the full-on expatriate families in the neighborhood.

The food was good and took me back to the days of Big John’s as a student, where £2 would get you a nice portion of fish and chips in a cardboard box — I haven’t a clue what kind of fish they used (Smith’s offers cod, haddock, plaice, dory, and halibut) — with lashings of malt vinegar and salt. Ah Big John’s, I remember your £4 doner kebabs in naan bread fondly. By the time I used to get home with my fish, everything would be soggy and I’d eat the fries with too much mayonnaise and it’d all be very satisfying. To be fair, Smith’s is better quality than that fast food stuff, closer to £8 spent in a nice part of London, but that’s what I was thinking of when I ate it.