Twice cook the chips

• Peel your potatoes. Cut into chip shapes – about 1cm square.

  >Ideally, you want them to be all roughly the same thickness so they cook evenly.
• Rinse in a colander to remove any excess starch.
  
• Add to a pan of cold water. Bring to the boil and leave boiling for 3 mins, or until the chips are just starting to soften.
• Drain. Place on some kitchen towel to remove the excess water. Allow the chips to cool to room temperature.

  >5 mins should be enough time
  
• Whilst they’re cooling, heat a pan of oil to 140oC

  >See “what pan should I use?” & “Haven’t got a thermometer?” above for tips
• Once it has reached temperature, *carefully* place a handful of chips in the pan at a time. Cook for 3 mins.

  >You’re looking for the chips to form a shell/crust on the outside, but they shouldn’t be browning yet. Like this picture…
  
• Quickly increase the heat, ideally bringing the oil to around 180oC, and cook the chips for another 2 mins (so the chips are cooking for 5 mins in total). At this point, they should be golden and cooked through.
• Remove with a slotted spoon & place on some kitchen roll to remove any excess oil.
• Repeat this for all your chips and then set aside whilst you start to cook your fish

Cook the fish

• Place the beer and flour into a large bowl. Whisk until reaaally smooth.

  >You can use a hand whisk or an electric whisk

  >Make sure you get right to the bottom of the bowl - flour tends to sneakily sit there.
• Scatter some flour on a plate/your worksurface. Place the fish onto the flour, making sure it gets a light dusting all over. Flip and dust the other side too.

  >This helps the batter to stick.
  
• Turn the oil up to around 180oC

  >I like to leave it at around 18ooC for a few mins before moving onto the next step. This is to make sure its at a consistent temperature and not slowly getting hotter and hotter!
• Take 1 piece of fish. Hold it by one end & lower it into the batter mix. Lift it out, allow any excess batter to drip off for 5 seconds and then CAREFULLY lower the fish into the oil.

  >It will spit so be careful!!!
• Cooking more than 1 piece of fish?

  *If they can comfortably fit in the same pan, coat the other pieces of fish and lower into the oil too.

  *If they can't fit, don’t worry they stay hot for ages. Cook the first and place on some kitchen roll whilst you’re cooking the others. This will absorb any excess oil and keep the batter crisp. You could use a cooling rack instead.
• Leave for 3 mins, then flip and cook on the other side for 2 mins.

Plate up and eat!