Whitby's The Magpie Cafe features in list of UK's top fish and chip shops

The Times has compiled a list of the top 18 places across the UK to visit for fish and chips, from 1940s-style restaurants to fishermen-founded takeaways.

And it probably comes as no surprise to see the Magpie – which is flourishing again following the devastating fire of 2017 – included on the list, with the reviewer hailing the Pier Road restaurant as “the quayside queen” of the town.

“I didn’t want the Magpie to be the best chippy in Whitby yet again,” the review read.

"Such was my determination to dethrone a restaurant that celebrated its platinum jubilee in 2009 that I sampled fish and chips from four other outlets in the town.

"It was all for nowt, though, because none came close to the quayside queen.

"The wine is terrible, the stairs steep, the floorboards creaky and the rooms like a funfair haunted house, and the restaurant menu is longer than a phone book — more in hope than expectation that someone will order anything but their fabulous beef-dripping fish and chips.

"But maybe one day try the Woof.

“Is it a dogfish?” ask customers.

“No, it’s a catfish,” grin the waitresses — and it’s true.

"Cod and chips £11.95.”

Diners at The Magpie Cafe got a surprise earlier in the year when operatic quartet G4 performed an a capella rendition of the Elton John classic Circle of Life, while dining there ahead of a show at Whitby Pavilion.

Flamborough chippy Lighthouse Fisheries also made the UK’s top chippies list.