Frying high at Japanese festival

A STRATFORD fish and chip restaurateur is flying half way across the world to serve fish and chips to the Japanese.

Stelios Tzirki, aged 20, of The Big Fish chippy restaurant at The Maybird Shopping Park, jetted off on Saturday and this week he will be frying and serving up Britain’s most famous dish to customers at the 27th Barakura Flower Festival in Chino, Japan.

He has been invited by his godfather to take part in an all-expenses paid, ten-day excursion which is intended to encourage Japanese people to tuck into a taste of Great Britain.

Stelios – who is undertaking the culinary mission with his godfather, Andy Thrasivoulou – will be joined by British garden lecturers and Scottish bagpipers at the event.

“The Barakura Gardens are very authentic British-styled gardens and so for the festival they naturally require traditional British food and they want it cooked by past fish and chip shop winners from the UK. My godfather’s chippy in Rugby was winner of Fish and Chip shop of the year in 2002, and The Big Fish, where I work, won the regionals ten years later. I’m looking forward to it. I’ve got five days of work and five of leisure so hope to do some hiking, karaoke and visit some historic temples,” Stelios told the Herald.

The challenge for Stelios is to work with the fish the Japanese give him to fry but he’s confident he knows enough tricks in the book to dish up a fish and chip treat for his Japanese customers.

“We can add soda water to lighten the batter, peanut butter to add taste and I might throw in a few Japanese ingredients as well,” said Stelios.

According to Stelios, cod and chips is still their best seller but other options on the menu at The Big Fish restaurant owned by his mother - Marina Angelides - include sea bass, white bait and calamari which is in keeping with family’s Greek heritage.

The family moved to England in 1957 and opened their first chip shop in Handsworth, Birmingham, next week their much loved fish and chips will be made in Japan.