Telephone: 0141-887 5665
Address: Terminal Building, Glasgow Airport.
(The original Harry Ramsden's is at White Cross, Guiseley, Nr Leeds, West Yorks. Telephone, 01943 874641.)
Few people realise that the inspiration for Jean-Paul Sartre's Being And Nothingness came to him in a Paris cafe, when he asked the waitress for a cup of coffee with no cream. "I'm sorry," she replied, "we're out of cream. How about with no milk?" And thus a philosophical masterpiece was born.
Similar ontologically paradoxical signals were emanating from the staff of the Harry Ramsden's franchise at Glasgow airport. Their "Happy to help" badges contrasted sharply with their "Don't dare ask me" expressions, and although they displayed a huge sign reading, "We don't have comment cards ... but it is our pledge to listen", they ignored my enquiries, being far too busy examining their complexions in the reflection from the Kiremko deep-fat fryer.
"Do you use the same techniques and ingredients as the original Harry Ramsden's in Yorkshire?" was what I wished to ascertain, but it was clear that they neither knew nor cared about such ancient gastronomic history. Well, when you're 18, I suppose you're more concerned with a philosophical paradox of your own: why are the same hormones that make you desperate for sex also giving you a baked bean face, thereby making it impossible to find a partner? Life doesn't get much crueller than that.
During my own baked bean face years, I spent a lot of time queueing with other regulars (around the block, if need be) to get a table at the original Ramsden's in Guiseley. And later, when I was a BBC producer, I often dropped in there with Russell Harty, who was another aficionado (a-fish-and-chips-ionado, actually) of the place.
On cold days, the aroma was better than any aperitif I've encountered, because Harry had cracked the secret of this classic British dish. The Belgians have perfected the art of double-fried chips, while the Japanese are expert at fish and tempura. But he'd combined the two techniques to produce crisp, delicate food that was rich without being greasy, cooked in traditional, delicious, artery-hardening, ventricle-clogging beef dripping. Just as it should be.
But then came 1988 and disaster, as that celebrated stand-alone restaurant fell into the clutches of a former KFC boss whose favourite aroma was the smell of money. Before you could say "one of each twice", he'd floated the business on the stock market, ruined the recipes (out went beef dripping and harbour-fresh fish, in came "blended vegetable oil" and improbably trapezoidal frozen fillets), franchised it out, buggered it up, and sold it on to the Compass group (owners of Little Chef and Moto service stations), who now operate some 170 Harry Ramsden's "outlets".
So here I was, perusing this link in a rusty chain at Glasgow airport (a gastronomic necropolis within an aviational metropolis), which not only served as a grotesque parody of the original food, but even had the gall to mimic the original interior and to display photos of the Guiseley restaurant in its 1930s heyday. However, instead of ceramic tiles, we had melamine. Instead of marble, we had more melamine. And, by rights, the synthetic staff should all have been called Melamine, too.
As for my fish, it looked as though it had melanoma. The airless, brick-like batter didn't even cover the fillet (although protecting the flesh from excessive heat and grease is its primary function), and it shattered like theatrical glass when prodded with a knife. Within was something that smelt of the Aswan Dam and resembled the scabrous scrapings from the gut of a long-dead whale, and the only saving grace was that my "portion" was smaller than a child's - a sort of genetically-modified fish finger. The mushy peas were at least edible, but the chips were limp and pallid, and (something Harry would never have allowed) there wasn't even the chance to wash it down with a refreshing glass of Vimto - a drink that would have been appropriate here, because it anagrams into "vomit".
Soon afterwards, out of a sense of fairness, I visited another Harry Ramsden's "Express" at a Moto service station on the M6, in case the Glasgow fiasco had been a one-off aberration. But no, this one was equally atrocious, because that's the problem with fast food franchises: they're all using the same prefabricated ingredients and the same automatic equipment, so if the central concept is flawed, the results will be uniformly dreadful.
Wherever I've lived, I've always sought out a good neighbourhood chippy, because they serve cheap and dependable comfort food, and Ramsden's is now trying to muscle in on that area, too, by setting up "locals". But this dismal mockery of our national dish simply cannot compete with the real thing, be it from Askey's in York (a master fish fryer who sadly closed in the 1980s) or the mobile chippy that still services the Cumbrian west coast. I never found out what it was called, but because it operated near Sellafield I did once suggest a name to the owner, hoping he'd slap it (in luminous paint, of course) on the side of his van: "Fission Chips."
· Open: All week, 11.30am-10pm.
Price: Full House (fish, chips and mushy peas with bread and butter), £8.88.
