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Wet Fish / Seafood Stalls

Is selling shelfish outside a pub, a countrywide thing, or is it limited to London and some home counties?

My Mrs is from Fleet and says she's never heard of the concept, but I've always hought it was usual throughout the UK??? Surely you'd get them at least in Grimsby and the like at least?

Seeing as there seems to be people from all over the UK on here, thought I'd pose the question.
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Comments

  • MrOneLung
    MrOneLung Posts: 27,092
    I’ll look into it 
  • cfgs
    cfgs Posts: 11,514
    There is a fish stall outside The Swan pub just down the road from the fire station in Maidstone.
  • Leuth
    Leuth Posts: 23,498
    edited June 2022
    Until I moved last month, I'd attend the Winkles seafood shack outside the Anchor & Hope every Friday. Whelks, cockles and crayfish my usual order. Must get back there soon, catch up with Lisa who runs it, who's very nice

    Aware this doesn't come close to answering the question though, lol
  • Covered End
    Covered End Posts: 52,272
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
  • AndyG
    AndyG Posts: 6,020
    It's very much a southern thing mate. 
  • EugenesAxe
    EugenesAxe Posts: 3,559
    Well, you could say Plymouth is a seafood city, and it’s absolutely not a thing here, pasties yes; seafood outside pubs: never.
  • superclive98
    superclive98 Posts: 4,865
    edited June 2022
    Don't know how anyone eats the disgusting stuff (shellfish not pasties!).
  • Leuth
    Leuth Posts: 23,498
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
    East Finchley. I know. Traitor. 
  • Gribbo
    Gribbo Posts: 8,665
    Don't know how anyone eats the disgusting stuff (shellfish not pasties!).
    Could live off it meself. Don't even bother taking the shell or shit pipe off the prawns. Head, tail and as many legs I can get hold of in one go, come off, and whatevers left goes down. Always suck the brains out the pawns head n all. 
  • Dave Rudd
    Dave Rudd Posts: 2,889
    Gribbo said:
    Don't know how anyone eats the disgusting stuff (shellfish not pasties!).
    Could live off it meself. Don't even bother taking the shell or shit pipe off the prawns. Head, tail and as many legs I can get hold of in one go, come off, and whatevers left goes down. Always suck the brains out the pawns head n all. 
    Ah, a connoisseur.

    You should check out Le Wouri down near Woolwich Dockyard.

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  • You can get crabs in Belvedere.
  • killerandflash
    killerandflash Posts: 70,453
    Leuth said:
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
    East Finchley. I know. Traitor. 
    Quite near me. I had wondered who had graffitied the Northern Line train with "Gilbey is a w*nker"
  • killerandflash
    killerandflash Posts: 70,453
    Leigh-on-sea near Southend has loads of seaford stalls
  • Gribbo said:
    Don't know how anyone eats the disgusting stuff (shellfish not pasties!).
    Could live off it meself. Don't even bother taking the shell or shit pipe off the prawns. Head, tail and as many legs I can get hold of in one go, come off, and whatevers left goes down. Always suck the brains out the pawns head n all. 
    That is possibly the most disgusting thing I have read on this forum.

  • Leuth
    Leuth Posts: 23,498
    Leuth said:
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
    East Finchley. I know. Traitor. 
    Quite near me. I had wondered who had graffitied the Northern Line train with "Gilbey is a w*nker"
    You jest! Actually, as North London goes it really isn't bad for getting to The Valley. Tube then train, takes just an hour. Could have been a lot worse
  • My mum absolutely adored winkles and other bits and bobs she got off some bloke on a Sunday afternoon. From memory, a geezer dinging a bell would come down our road flogging shellfish and my old mum would be first in the queue. Then came our move oop north and I'll never forget my mums utter disappointment on the realisation that the winkle man didn't exist up north, she sat in such anticipation on that first sunday waiting for the ding dong man to arrive with her pots of winkles. The enormity of our move certainly sank in that day.

    Then shortly after she found out that saveloys didn't exist oop north. My poor old mum, even the delicacies of chips and gravy and fish with curry sauce couldn't console her    
  • Gribbo
    Gribbo Posts: 8,665
    Leuth said:
    Leuth said:
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
    East Finchley. I know. Traitor. 
    Quite near me. I had wondered who had graffitied the Northern Line train with "Gilbey is a w*nker"
    You jest! Actually, as North London goes it really isn't bad for getting to The Valley. Tube then train, takes just an hour. Could have been a lot worse
    Youre right, it could take an hour and 15 minutes
  • Gribbo
    Gribbo Posts: 8,665
    Leuth said:
    Where have you moved to Leuth (if you wish to answer)?
    East Finchley. I know. Traitor. 
    Quite near me. I had wondered who had graffitied the Northern Line train with "Gilbey is a w*nkler"

  • Growing up on Abbey Wood Estate, we had a regular guy in a van coming around (I think on Sundays) selling seafood. From memory his cry used to be "Shrimps and Winkles".
    Shrimps were like miniscule Prawns. Almost too small to justify the effort.
    I do remember eating winkles. God knows why. Used to have to prize them out of the shell with a sewing needle or something. They looked like something you would pick out of your nose.
    Probably tasted like it as well.
    There seemed to be a constant stream of vendors or tradesmen passing through.
    The Faggot Man (not an American euphemism), Toffee Apple Man, The Walls Ice Cream man, Mr. Whippy, Rossi, Tonibell, Corona soft drinks, Mackintosh's soft drinks, The Old Gypsy woman calling "Rag and Bone", The Milkman, The Baker, The Dustman and the Coalman. Probably forgot some.
    Sorry, I digress.

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  • Probably the most famous sea food name in London belonged to Tubby Isaac's.

    I never called on his stall in Aldgate despite passing it on a daily basis.  I guess that's part of the reason for it's closure in 2013. :/

    https://spitalfieldslife.com/2013/06/13/so-long-tubby-isaacs-jellied-eel-stall/




  • Stig
    Stig Posts: 29,296
    I thought they were all killed off by Squiddley Diddley humanising fish ;)
  • Probably the most famous sea food name in London belonged to Tubby Isaac's.

    I never called on his stall in Aldgate despite passing it on a daily basis.  I guess that's part of the reason for it's closure in 2013. :/

    https://spitalfieldslife.com/2013/06/13/so-long-tubby-isaacs-jellied-eel-stall/




    I courted a girl from Limehouse in the late 70's who introduced me to his shit famous stall 
  • Hal1x
    Hal1x Posts: 4,265
    Stig said:
    I thought they were all killed off by Squiddley Diddley humanising fish ;)
    not forgetting Flipper and the Man from Atlantis.
  • MuttleyCAFC
    MuttleyCAFC Posts: 47,823
    edited June 2022
    It is an old London tradition, associated with its working class, sadly dying out now. The Anchor and Hope has a nice seafood/shell fish stall. I recall getting the winkles with my nan from outside our local in Islington as a boy. A fair bit of work teasing them out of the shell without breaking them using a saftey pin. Delicious though. I developed a taste for seafood and am one of the few who loves Whelks.


  • Gribbo
    Gribbo Posts: 8,665
    I was saying to my Mrs last night that me and my brother would go down to the one Peter Darkins had outside The Horse years ago, with a list from my nan or dad, and get Sunday tea. This was long before Peter eventually ended up running the pub itself. Can remember us all sitting round in the living room and getting the winkles out their shells with pins from my mums sewing box. 

    Also, 2 of my good friends had a go at running one up outside The Woodman, Blackfen. Think it lasted a couple of years before both their Mrs started having kids and they didn't get the time to carry it on.

    Maybe it being popular in London had something to do with London being a port years ago and also having Billingsgate Market to hand? I just always assumed it was popular all over the UK, a bit like fish & chip shops.
  • AndyG
    AndyG Posts: 6,020
    We used to get ours from the stall outside The Sun In The Sands every sunday. Winkle sandwiches with vinegar & pepper and a pint of prawns. If I was really lucky some whelks as well
  • EugenesAxe
    EugenesAxe Posts: 3,559
    edited June 2022
    Hal1x said:
    Stig said:
    I thought they were all killed off by Squiddley Diddley humanising fish ;)
    not forgetting Flipper and the Man from Atlantis.
    *That shark thing: he had more GCE’s than you!
  • bolloxbolder
    bolloxbolder Posts: 8,043
    Always used to be one outside the now defunct Great Harry in Parsonage Manorway Erith. 
  • HastingsRed
    HastingsRed Posts: 1,668
    Leigh-on-sea near Southend has loads of seaford stalls
    Same here.