Time warp: The dining room is much the same as it was on opening in 1958
(Picture: Adrian Lourie)Getting recognised in a restaurant is just something I have had to steadily adjust to. Servers widen their eyes in alarm; chefs emerge from the kitchen to deliver dish introductions freighted with unspoken tension. It can be strange and awkward. It is also a very minor hazard in the context of what remains an almost obnoxiously jammy and privileged job.
But at The Fryer’s Delight, a storied, 54-year-old fish and chip shop in Holborn, I have never felt happier to see that flicker of recognition on someone’s face, though I wasn’t being clocked for this column or TV or anything to do with restaurant criticism at all. No, I was being spotted as a long-lapsed regular; the guy who worked over the road and would duck in for a takeaway chip butty, a vinegar-doused fish cake or, in times of especially pronounced hangover, an enormous portion of sausage in batter and chips that would reliably prompt an acute mix of both horror and jealousy in an open-plan office.
