Our Common Language

[Brian]

Well, just finished my evening meal, which I purchased on the way home at one of our take-away places known as fish and chip shops (commonly referred to as "chippies"- I believe you have something similar over there.

If you don't know about these places you soon will if you ever come over. No town or village is complete with out one, and cities like Edinburgh have dozens.Basically they sell fish and chips (french fries to you ), nicely deep fried and served up (sometimes) in a little caredboard tray, sometimes just in greaseproof paper, and then wrapped in some outer wrapping for warmth, traditionally yesterday's newspaper (honest!). Larger establishments don't restrict themselves to fish - they also do various meat pies, sausages, pizzas, spring rolls and all sorts of wonderful things like red puddings, black puddings (don't ask) and of course haggis, which is what I had (yummy!) .

A word about terminology - in Scotland (but not in England) you will see, on the menu on the wall, everything comes with 2 prices - one marked "single", and the other marked "supper". The difference is simply that "supper" includes chips, and "single" doesn't. If you ask for a single fish, you won't necessarily just get one (depends on the establishment concerned) but you certainly won't get chips!

Bri


[This message has been edited by Brian (edited 07 January 2000).]

[jinmich]

Minnie
The men are the same all over

At first they are all ga ga and after that they take you for granted

Unless of course it's my husband, he has always worshipped me!!!!!I am to be sure not to take him for granted

Uh oh, he comes home early tonight, I had better get back to the real world soon, he's expectin a cake 2-nite

Janet

Janet

[Willy]

...and I think most Americans are surprised to not be served ketchup with their chips and when asking for salad dressing receive mayonnaise! Also, I can't help but notice how few ice cubes are put into cold drinks over there.

Yes Brian, our take-away places are "take-out" or "drive-throughs" when one orders take out food from their car. Usually pizza & sub places will deliver food to your home but when in Beverly Hills I saw a 24 hour Liquor Store, ("Off-License"?) that delivered! What service! (*chuckle*)

[jinmich]

I realize this might sound stupid..
Are there take out in the big cities-pizza, ribs etc
moreover do the smaller towns have the same?

McDonalds, Pizza Hut? Or even Pizza ?

In Scotland?

This is research Just wonderin..or am I wanderin to far from my drink?

Not for me though-I bet there is a lot of delivery service that could go on in America
People are just so busy and would waste their money on lots of things-food especially!!!!

[Brian]

Yeah, we have drive-through McDonald's and delivery services too. Everything from pizzas to Chinese or Indian (Asian) food can be delivered. Some offer a free bottle of wine if you order over a certain amount.
Willie, most chippes (fish'n'chip shops) will offer brown sauce, salt and vinegar at no extra charge, and yes, Janet, we do have Pizza Hut (and other Pizza places), and McDonald's and Safeway supermarkets

Oh, we have Baked Potato takeaways as well, with a choice of fillings. If anyone's coming to Edinburgh and wants to know the best of these, let me know!

Bri

[Willy]

London has some of the best take-away places in the world with it's international make up!
Everything from Hungarian to Japanese and Indian food and on and on,
but the nice thing are that many of these places are independantly owned, (as opposed to the huge corporate conglomerates such as McDonalds and KFC which sadly seem everywhere with exception of the smaller towns.)

A big difference though is that smoking is permitted in almost all restaurants. (Here in CA it's against the law to smoke inside or outside, even cafe style seating, AND in bars or pubs!) Most of my non smoking European friends love that but the smokers are quite surprised).
Also, Legoland recently applied for an alcohol license for serving beer & wine in the themepark, (being a European Company I don't think they thought that much about it), but the public outcry was major and they dropped the matter altogether.

[Brian]

We have a fair international mix in Edinburgh as well - I recently noticed a Thai takeaway I hadn't seen before.
In the restaurant line we have (searching Yellow Pages) Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Mexican, Italian, French, Swiss, Spanish, Armenian, Caribbean, Greek, Nepalese, Mongolian etc.

Bri