Crispies Fish & Chips, Cape Town CBD: Fish & Chips Top 5

SA Logue brings you the top five places in Cape Town for fish & chips. See our Fish & Chips Top 5 tag for more.

Crispies
87 Plein St. (cnr. Barrack)
Cape Town CBD | Map

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Specialty: Fish & Chips
Tel: +27 (0) 21 461 7759
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Further Insight & Opinion
She may not look like much on the outside, but she’s the seaworthiest shop at anchor in the Cape Town CBD for fish and chips. I’ve been eating at Crispies for ten years now, and can happily report that it has a 100% satisfaction record in each of the Fresh, Hot, Tasty, and Cheap departments.

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It’s located on the less fashionable side of town – the eastern half of the CBD, on the far side of Parliament – so attracts an almost exclusively local clientele (including MPs from across the street). And it lives up to its name – you won’t find crispier fried fish anywhere on the Cape Peninsula, including Fish Hoek Fisheries, which, although it occupies the number one spot, is under constant pressure from this small, city-bound storefront, that it has just shaded into second spot.

Best order at Crispies: without a doubt, it’s the Hake & Chips Roll. Crispies is staggeringly generous when it comes to this particular order: you usually get two pieces of fried hake, plus a mountain of slap (limp) chips, bundled into a “Portuguese” (powdered) roll, soaked in salt and vinegar, then wrapped up tight in paper, which will keep it piping hot for up to a half hour. Two can easily share a single order, bringing the total bill to about R9 each.

Note: The Cape Town CBD’s east side requires a bit more alertness than its tourist-friendly west side. If you’ve been to major cities in other parts of Africa, you’ll recognize the feeling of sticking out, which, I’ll grant, can be rather bracing after the fairly tame environs of Long Street and Greenmarket Square. The fish is worth this quick foray out of the comfort zone, believe me!