WHY don't fish and chip shops deliver as standard? Given how they're usually wrapped, that would be the newspaper in the house too. Kill two birds, though gaining one stone.
Let me explain. I read this week about the Bombay Bicycle Club being taken over. Not the well-established restaurant of the same name in Edinburgh's Tollcross, but a select group of curry emporia in London, which also bears the name of a Raj lunching
society. What's interesting about this to anyone who isn't a Cockney into curry is the Bombay Bicycle Club's new owner says it could be expanded to hundreds of locations throughout Britain. It is, he says, the Indian Domino's Pizza.
Right then, I thought "yeah". An Indian restaurant that actually WANTS to deliver. My local curry parlour claims to. But ask them to rev up their scooter and do naans on wheels and – korma chameleon! – they change into a takeaway only. Not in so many words. But the order will take two hours to arrive – complete with fresh spices from Goa, evidently – yet if you offer to collect, it will be ready in 15 minutes. (Perhaps takeaway is targeting the male market. Picking anything up is an ego boost; even if it's a saag paneer.)
The prospect of enthusiastic Indian restaurants then got me dreaming of modern meals on wheels heaven. Some sectors are not just reluctant, but historically resistant, to delivering us from hunger. But if the Bombay Bicycle Club chain did become the Indian Domino's, it might inspire fish and chip shops to form a national cod squad. A deep-fried Domino's, in effect, which makes sense as it's always hard to park outside a chippie.
And why aren't suppers usually delivered? Are chippies worried about the carbon footprint of a fish supper? Hardly. Otherwise an industry notorious for deep fried Mars Bars, would be better known as a deep-fried Friend of the Earth. And, as some car engines now run on fuel partly from chip shops' cooking oil, there's no excuse. They'd only have to tip the deep-fat fryer into the tank.
The delivery market is there. Results from Domino's this week showed thin crust is defying the credit crunch. Sales are up, on the internet especially. If chippies took online orders on cod.net – assuming it doesn't contravene EU quotas – a further piece of the action that awaits.
Who knows what might follow? The Indian and deep-fried Dominoes might merge and a new option of battered chicken tikka masala could even update the nation's favourite dish. Health-wise, it's not exactly what the doctor ordered. But if it's delivered, so what?
Increase in dram-a queensONCE, malt whisky societies could count the number of women drinkers on their fingers. That's real fingers, not those in a glass. Now, dram is the new glam. At the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, a quarter of new members are now women, up from a tenth. If that rise continues, gender-wise, the society is well on its way to being half-cut.
What a pity the Sex and the City movie has just finished its run.
Had these figures emerged earlier, malt could have enjoyed some nifty product placement. To recover from being jilted, Carrie might have holidayed in Edinburgh rather than a sunshine resort.
And, by sipping malt, she'd confirm it to be the latest girly, flirty tipple. You think not? Too much of a man mouthful? Hah. Malt, when consumed in Scotland, is a drink with an umbrella. In the hand of the drinker not the glass. But still.
• SUCH has been the interest in today's by-election that many foreign TV channels have sent reporters. Their concern is the contest's implications for Gordon Brown, rather than ensuring no voters back home lack nuanced analysis of key issues in Easterhouse. Rumour has it even the newly outward-looking China sent a crew from its 24-hour English language news channel.
Interviewees, however, have been hard to find. "Och, I'm no appearing on that," said a local, when told the name. "That's the polis channel. My bruther got dun on that." The Chinese station is called CCTV. As in Central China Television.
The full article contains 712 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
