The March of The Halloumi Fries
We hadn’t been in a restaurant in eighteen months, but we had a week away at last, going via Kenilworth to Lancashire and back home via Stratford-upon-Avon. Halloumi fries (aka Halloumi sticks) were everywhere. I was curious, so on return, I looked at Poole menus online. Then we went out for lunch with a friend in Fordingbridge, New Forest today.
These were mainly gastropubs. We liked all of them … but where did halloumi fries come from? EVERY menu had them except the Royal Shakespeare Company Rooftop Restaurant in Stratford.
Halloumi Fries have followed chorizo, butternut squash, rocket and sweet potato onto the “essential item on a menu” list. I’m not being snotty about halloumi, I’ve cooked with it and we have some in the fridge. I just took a photo. It’s sell by today. But I’ve never fried it in batter.
In Warwickshire we asked if they might have one of our favourite cheeses of all, Berkswell Ewes. No, but they had halloumi fries.
In Lancashire we wondered if we might find a crumbly Lancashire, or as we were up on the Yorkshire border and one was just across it, a nice Wensleydale (after all we did do the ELT adaptation of Wallace and Gromit and like Wallace are partial to a Wensleydale.) Sadly not, but they had halloumi fries.
I checked Dorset menus, looking for a Dorset Blue Vinny, as my name may derive from prominent veins too. Or perhaps a soft cheese from Cranborne Chase? No, but they had halloumi fries in batter.
So to Hampshire. A nice New Forest Lyburn Farm cheese? Old Winchester perhaps? Or Stoney Cross? Maybe Lyburn Garlic and Nettle? No, but we have halloumi fries. And halloumi burger.
And mango and pomegranate salad with halloumi … the last isn’t in batter if you want a healthy option. Karen ordered it. Pomegranate seeds are good for the heart, so do they counteract it?
I remember seeing deep fried mozzarella in an Italian restaurant on Long Island. It was larger than a block of butter and covered in thick batter. It was a block of thick globby greasy and tasteless cheese in batter. Halloumi is much the same, a bland very salty cheese with the advantage of deep frying well.
I mentioned it to a friend who said first, it was because of the need for hot protein dishes for the increasing number of vegetarians. Restaurants need stuff where they can stick a green V on the menu. Then he added, ‘They’ve become vegetarian for their health, and then they’ve opted for deep fried fat in batter as a healthy meal. Are Deep Fried Mars Bars (a Scottish speciality) vegetarian too?’
I also asked in a Lancashire gastropub how deep fried halloumi had become so popular. She explained. Same reason they no longer have a fresh fruit buffet for breakfast. Covid. A cheese selection is exposed. Deep fried food like sticks of halloumi will destroy any germs.
So, a recent investigation in five counties, north, midlands and south, reveals that halloumi now appears to be Britain’s most popular cheese.
Incidentally, sweet potato fries are following fast behind. That’s another story.
SEE ALSO: Chorizo is Vile
I lived in Athens for over a decade and the Cypriot taverna down the road was one of my favourite places. Salty, squeaky-textured halloumi scorched on the griddle was not cheap then and such a treat along with the hummus and tabbouleh and sheftalia and dog-rough wine. It must surely be much cheaper to toss it on the grill for a few seconds than fry it in batter? And much nicer.
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I agree, I’ve done it on dry grill or BBQ. I have seen “Greek halloumi fries” on menus, a common British restaurant confusion between Greek and Cypriot (as most UK Greek restaurants used to be Cypriot).
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I hate sweet potato; seriously hate it.
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