Fish and Chips ?

[Muggins in Sussex]

In 1901, Maude M Allison is a "Fish and Potato Shop Keeper, Coffee House (?)"

http://search.ancestry.co.uk/iexec/?htx=view&r=5538&dbid=7814&iid=YRKRG13_4343_4346-0826&fn=Maude+M&ln=Allison&st=r&ssrc=&pid=27668939

Presumably it wasn't fish and chips as we know them :confused:. I just wondered what it entailed

[Olde Crone]

Why not fish and chips as we know them? They've been around a very long time!

OC

[Muggins in Sussex]

Thanks OC - I'd just assumed chips were a relatively recent thing :o

[Margaret in Burton]

Yes, loads of them. Sometimes just referred to as fish shop.

[Muggins in Sussex]

Thanks Margaret...just wondering whether they deep fried the fish in batter :confused:

[Olde Crone]

Oh, yes!

Here's a useless fact: Did you know that fish and chips was the only food not on ration during WW1 And WW2?

OC

[Gert in Oz]

I just came across a "battered fish and chip shop" as part of an address in the 1901 census, not one of mine though.

Sylvia

[Nell]

My ex's Jewish ancestors ran fishmongers and also fried fish shops - takeaway food for the pre-McDonalds era! A Jewish friend of mine told me that chips were a Jewish invention. I guess maybe they were given a more exotic name to start with.

[Breckland Jane]

According to wikipedia, the first fish and chip shop was opened in London by Jewish proprietor Joseph Malin in 1860.

Jane

[Muggins in Sussex]

Thanks Jane - I hadn't realised that fish and chips had been around for so longer.

Maude was working "on her own account" and at home - I guess she sold them from her kitchen door. :confused:

[kiterunner]

Most likely she lived above the shop.

[Muggins in Sussex]

I didn't think of that! Doh!!

Thanks Kite:)

[samesizedfeet]

when fish and chips shops first started they weren't shops. They were sold through windows in the sides of houses. People would set them up as at home businesses so they didn't need to be in a run of shops etc.

I'm sure this was the subject of a WDYTYA at some point.

[Olde Crone]

Zoe

They called them house shops in Lancashire.

My 2 x GGM was afflicted with a drinky sort of a husband, and in an effort to get her hands on a bit of cash, set up a house shop in her front parlour where she sold small quantities of groceries - one egg, a twist of salt, a tablespoon of jam etc.

She threw a white cloth over the parlour table and pushed it either in front of the door or the window, and hey presto, a shop! The cloth came off at night and they all ate their dinner at the table.

She also "took in" meat pies and hotpots and cooked them for the owners, usually women who worked all day at the Mill. The charge was one halfpenny.

There were still dozens of these shops in Manchester when I was a child, selling all sorts. Every back street had at least six shops as well as the corner shop.

OC

[Val in Oz]

This is a really interesting thread people:)

seriously....................food for thought:d:d

more seriously.........I hadn't known people had shops in their houses, and maybe that is how my grandfather who was a grocer in the Cambridge village of Brinkley - sold his wares. Thankyou

[Muggins in Sussex]

It certainly is interesting, Val

I have learned more from this thread than I have been able to from Googling :)