Egg and chips
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2015}}
{{Use British English|date=May 2015}}
Egg and chips is a popular dish in the United Kingdom, consisting simply of chips served with fried eggs.
Associations
Egg and chips became popular in Britain during World War I due to a shortage of meat.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aekfAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA239|title=The Cambridge Companion to the Poetry of the First World War|editor=Santanu Das|publisher=Cambridge University Press|date=11 November 2013|isbn=9781107470088}} It was a favourite food of Tommies behind the lines on the Western Front in northern France and Belgium, eaten at establishments "estaminet", which also sold cheap wine and beer.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yDouDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA69|title=Tommies: The British Army in the Trenches|first1=John|last1=Sadler|first2=Rosie|last2=Serdiville|date=19 August 2017|publisher=Casemate|isbn=978-1612004853|quote=One Belgian dish really caught on and was taken home: egg and chips}}{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lzElDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA318|title=The British Empire and the First World War|editor=Ashley Jackson|publisher=Taylor & Francis|date=26 June 2017|isbn=978-1317374657|quote='Tummy' shows a French peasant woman who has rustled up the usual menu for soldiers, egg and chips.}}{{cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LyAfAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA130|title=Food in Zones of Conflict: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives|chapter=Alternatives to the ration for British soldiers|editor=Paul Collinson, Helen Macbeth|publisher=Berghahn Books|date=2014|isbn=978-1782384045|quote=In fact, the staple, often the only dish on the estaminets' menus was egg and chips, for which the men had an enormous passion}}{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10066467/Beef-tea-potato-pie-and-duff-pudding-How-to-eat-like-a-WW1-Tommy.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130613065454/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10066467/Beef-tea-potato-pie-and-duff-pudding-How-to-eat-like-a-WW1-Tommy.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=13 June 2013|last=Copping|first=Jasper|title=Beef tea, potato pie and duff pudding: How to eat like a WW1 Tommy|work=The Telegraph|date=19 May 2013|quote=The establishments introduced into the language term for cheap wine, “plonk” from “vin blank”, and also popularised as a dish egg and chips – cheap and available food not widely on offer in the army.}}
Egg and chips is associated with a working-class diet. In an article on moving from the working class to the middle class, a British journalist recounted that "There are things I grew up with that I still love—pub life, darts, egg and chips".{{cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/class-for-sammy-the-difference-between-being-working-class-and-middle--class-was-a-university-degree-for-mike-the-difference-was-a-few-million-quid-they-discuss-the-experience-of-moving-up-a-class-with-beverley-hopwood-1305441.html|title=Class: For Sammy the difference between being working class and middle class was a university degree. For Mike, the difference was a few million quid. They discuss the experience of moving up a class with Beverley Hopwood|last=Hopwood |first=Beverley|date=18 April 1996|work=The Independent|accessdate=2009-06-15}} Jack Charlton, after playing in the World Cup-winning England football team in 1966, remarked: "We stopped the car for egg and chips in a transport cafe. We'd eaten nothing but the best food for weeks and I was dying for some ordinary grub."{{cite news|url=http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/sport/north-east-football/2002/09/24/i-celebrated-after-winning-the-world-cup-by-having-egg-and-chips-in-a-transport-caf-xe9-79310-12225251/|title=I celebrated after winning the World Cup by having egg and chips in a transport café|date=24 September 2002|work=Evening Chronicle|accessdate=2009-06-15}} The image of British people insisting on ordering egg and chips while on holiday abroad has also been used as a stereotype.{{cite news|url=http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article472579.ece?token=null&offset=0&page=1|title=You'd better get used to the wet|last=Driscoll|first=Margarette|date=22 August 2004 |work=The Sunday Times|accessdate=2009-06-15 | location=London}}{{dead link|date=September 2024|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}}
Health
In a study on the perceptions of social inequality of people in North West England, "Beer, fags, egg and chips" was highlighted by the researchers as an example of individual behaviour thought to be connected to poor health.{{cite journal|doi=10.1111/1467-9566.t01-1-00322|pmid=14498942|last=Popay|first=Jennie|author2=Bennett, Sharon |author3=Thomas, Carol |author4=Williams, Gareth |author5=Gatrell, Anthony |author6= Bostock, Lisa |year=2003|title=Beyond 'beer, fags, egg and chips'? Exploring lay understandings of social inequalities in health|journal=Sociology of Health & Illness|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|volume=25|issue=1|pages=1–23|doi-access=free}}
Reception
Food writer Mary Cadogan says that "Egg and chips for me is a marriage made in heaven. Whenever I feel the need of a bit of comfort eating this is the dish I usually turn to."{{cite web|url=http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/blog/075-egg-chips/ |title=Egg and chips |last=Cadogan |first=Mary |date=10 April 2008 |work=Good Food blog |publisher=BBC |accessdate=2009-06-15 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110722183643/http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/blog/075-egg-chips/ |archivedate=22 July 2011 |df=dmy }} Heston Blumenthal, owner of the Michelin star award-winning Fat Duck restaurant in Berkshire, wrote in The Guardian that "You can't get much more British a dish than fried egg and chips."{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2002/jun/22/weekend7.weekend10|title=Good fry day|last=Blumenthal|first=Heston|date=22 June 2002|work=The Guardian|accessdate=2009-06-15}}
In popular culture
The dish features in art as well as in real life. Egg and chips occupies a pivotal moment in the suffocating life of a working-class Liverpool housewife in Shirley Valentine. "Because it's Thursday, Shirley knows that Joe expects steak and chips for his tea. He is getting egg and chips instead... But Joe ... is not pleased at his meatless meal. He pushes his plate into her lap. That settles it. Two weeks later he comes home and finds an empty house."{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/02/12/theater/shirley-decides-she-s-had-enough.html|title=Shirley Decides She's Had Enough|last=Maddox|first=Brenda|date=12 February 1989|work=New York Times|accessdate=2009-06-15}}
The dish's status as a cornerstone of authentic British cuisine is solidified by its regular inclusion in modern popular culture. It features regularly in television depictions of British life, such as the long-running soap series Coronation Street, where it constitutes part of recurring character Johnny "Doc" Docherty's infamous catch phrase, "You've just had your tea, Lesley - Egg and Chips!"[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ch9M34Vf7s Coronation Street, 11 May 2012], Johnny Doc (Tony Hirst) deploys his catchphrase.
In Final Fantasy VII Remake, on the back wall of the bar 7th Heaven, there is a neon sign which reads "EGGS & CHIPS".