Chips with everything

Chips with everything

It’s odd that the Americans call them French Fries, because if you ask me the Belgians make much better ones. I suppose the term Belgian Fries doesn’t have the same ring to it, so maybe the Americans have a point. But for the Belgians, cooking chips is a matter of high expertise, a fine art comparable to bread-making. And, they have the wonderful idea of having mayonnaise with them. There’s something particularly special about a packet of chips on a winter’s evening after a visit to the bar. The Germans and the Dutch come a close second, though the Germans are truly best at sausages.

Of all the colonial legacies, chips must be the most enduring one in the DRC. When I compare the standard offering of chips at a British-inspired Kenyan or South African take-away place with its Congolese equivalent, I marvel that anyone would even eat the British equivalent. Maybe it’s what you’re used to.

Here they’re almost as good as the Belgian ones, even in tiny unsophisticated little restaurants: very hot, slightly crisp on the outside and with a perfect flavour. That’s pretty amazing considering the difficulty they have here of growing potatoes, which do not like hot climates.

After my last medical check the doctor looked at me with concern. “You’re cholesterol’s up, and it looks as though you’ve been having a very salty diet.”

Yup – it’s the chips. The problem here is that they use palm oil which has high cholesterol. And the salt – well that stands to reason. So now I have to cut down a bit on the chips.

But how? The highlight of the week is a trip with the dogs to a man-made lake. After about an hour’s drive, we walk all round the lake – a distance of about six kilometres. After that, obviously, one needs lunch, and what better than a large beer and chicken and chips, which we have at the little lake-side restaurant? It has become such a feature of the week that on the odd occasion when we can’t do it we feel deprived.

It’s not only at the lake that we have chicken and chips. There’s a very famous restaurant in the heart of the African part of town. The street is always full of pedestrians trying to decide which little bar to go to, honking cars, and neon lights. If you don’t know exactly where to find it you never will, as there is no sign and the entrance is an unassuming small doorway. It gives us expatriates a frisson to go there and feel that, unlike the area we live in, we are in the REAL AFRICA. So typically we ask our driver to take us there, and boast about the experience afterwards. A few real know-it-alls (like us) know the way and drive ourselves, which puts us very high up in the boasting stakes.

When they take your order they ask how many you would like. Assuming that they are asking how many people want chicken one will say, for example, five chicken, one steak and one fish. Mistake! What they’re asking is how many whole chickens you want. It’s not just the chicken and chips which is good. The beer is cold and the ambience is nice and homely and the service is pretty good. It also boasts a bar with a band where one can dance until the small hours.

The same restaurant has since opened a place in the respectable end of town, where you can eat in a bushy garden. The attraction of this one is (a) that you can find it and (b) that you feel secure. The gamble has paid off – as soon as you get near you see the phalanxes of 4 x 4s which show that you’re not the only one interested in chicken and chips that evening.

Whenever the subject of chicken and chips comes up there’s a lively debate as to which is best. Because, on Friday nights the French Cultural centre serves the very same, and many people swear that theirs is the best and will make sure to keep Friday evenings free just for that. There, there’s no issue of how many chickens you want though the orders are taken in exactly the same way, because the price is the same whether you have quarter of a chicken or two or ten.

Then there is the club at the British Embassy which hosts special quiz nights and shows big sporting events on its big screen TV. The food served, as a special attraction? Yup, the same.

Not surprisingly, the Embassy decided to show the Royal Wedding on 29^th April. In view of the widespread interest, it was open to everyone. Since the wedding was in the morning, and the customers would feel a bit peckish after three or four hours of toasting the happy couple, food had to be served. Chicken and chips? Alas, not this time. A statement had to be made. Something British. Of course, fish and chips.