In the UK a fish and chips shop is sometimes called a "chip shop". The New York Times helpfully translated this in a recent article:
> “I’ve seen lots of students my age struggling, trying to get work and even the basic necessities,” Agastya Dhar, 17, said. Mr. Dhar has a part-time job in a French fry restaurant, but said even getting that job was tough.
French fry restaurant is now my preferred term for the local chippy. For those outside the UK chip shops normally have no seating, or maybe a couple of uncomfortable, uninviting, flourescent lit plastic benches and tables, normally bolted down, maybe sprayed clean at the end of the night.
In the Netherlands we have two words for fries and you know if someone is from the north or the south based on their use: Patat, north en Friet, south, particularly in the South people are sensitive to using the wrong, northern word. (And chips are just crisps here.)
Chips are definitely a thing in the UK. Like French fries but usually chunkier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fish_and_chips
Which is called Fish and Chips in Canada, even though it's served with fries.
In the UK a fish and chips shop is sometimes called a "chip shop". The New York Times helpfully translated this in a recent article:
> “I’ve seen lots of students my age struggling, trying to get work and even the basic necessities,” Agastya Dhar, 17, said. Mr. Dhar has a part-time job in a French fry restaurant, but said even getting that job was tough.
French fry restaurant is now my preferred term for the local chippy. For those outside the UK chip shops normally have no seating, or maybe a couple of uncomfortable, uninviting, flourescent lit plastic benches and tables, normally bolted down, maybe sprayed clean at the end of the night.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/26/world/europe/uk-budget-yo...
In the Netherlands we have two words for fries and you know if someone is from the north or the south based on their use: Patat, north en Friet, south, particularly in the South people are sensitive to using the wrong, northern word. (And chips are just crisps here.)
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I heard some restaurant getting sued for selling "fish and chips" without fish, but I don't remember how it ended
Same in the US
If you are lucky, you get triple-fried chips. Which are just as good/bad as they sound.
> just as good/bad as they sound.
I.e. extremely good and not at all bad.
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The chunkier fries are akin to what the US calls steak fries and are very common in the US as well.
That's gastro pub chips though, not chippy chips.
What Americans call chips (potato or corn) the UK typically calls crisps.
There is a Douglas Adams inspired The Great British Bake Off subplot out there somewhere.
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Brown sauce and malt vinegar.
Senf or GTFO.
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