ONE SUMMER AGO, before the region’s fish and chip industry was shaken by closures, before a death that was hard for people to bear, a lorry heaped with the first fresh potatoes of the season drove along the east coast of Scotland. This lorry wound its way along the East Neuk of Fife, dodging washing lines, mooring bollards and seagulls, parking with impunity to make deliveries. There was an understanding in the East Neuk that nobody would ever get angry and honk at the inbound “tattie” lorry, fish and chips being a staple meal, vital to the region’s economy. Tourists come shocking distances to sit on old harbour walls and stab around in takeaway trays with wooden forks. The fish and chips sold in the East Neuk might be the best in Britain and because of that (it follows) the best on the planet. Even so, by July 2022, local friers were finding it harder and harder to balance their books.
The driver of the tattie lorry, a red-cheeked Scotsman named Richard Murray, carried keys for most of the shops on his route, to save waking any tired friers who’d been up late the night before, poring anxiously over their sums. War in Ukraine coupled with ongoing complications from Brexit had driven up prices of almost all the goods that chip shops depend on, from fish to oil and salt to packaging. More distressing was the rising cost of energy. The great guzzling range cookers must be kept on all through the trading day. As the price of gas and electricity threatened to double, then triple, friers were opening their energy bills with gritted teeth. A trade association called the National Federation of Fish Friers said that as many as a third of the UK’s 10,500 shops might go dark.
It was about 8am when Murray drove his tattie lorry into a village called Pittenweem. He was met on the road by Alec Wyse, a skilled frier, 59 years old and known as Eck, who ran the Pittenweem Fish Bar. The tiny shop had been bought by Wyse’s father using money from the sale of a family fishing boat. There were nautical portraits on the walls. A peg-letter menu listed eight unchanging menu items. Working together, Wyse and Murray unloaded sacks of potatoes, carrying them inside on their shoulders.
A little way along the shore from Pittenweem, in the smarter harbour town of Anstruther, Murray parked outside the Wee Chippy. Founded by Ian Fleming, a 64-year-old seafood trader with a tattoo of a shark on his forearm, the Wee Chippy stood across
