UK - Happy Chip on a natural high

[Alfa]

Happy Chip on a natural high

Martin Wainwright
Thursday December 18, 2003

Welcome to the Northerner, Guardian Unlimited's weekly digest of the best of the northern papers.


SOMETHING FISHY ABOUT THAT CHIPPY


Ho, ho, ho - and a happy Christmas to one and all, especially to The Happy Chip takeaway in Newcastle upon Tyne, whose customers are said to be happy indeed. After the catalogue of horrors heard by the courts in recent weeks, the chippy in Waterloo Street is set to offer us some rather more cheerful - and scientifically instructive - legal debate early in the new year.


Fish and chips weren't the only thing on customers' menus, according to a curious prosecution spotted by the local Evening Chronicle as it trawled through the magistrates' court list. Not content with the vigorous buzz given by non-brewed condiment or mushy peas, the chippy is accused of dishing out "magic mushrooms" along with the battered fish and spud.


Since, under certain conditions, the fungi contain psilocin and psilocybin, the Happy Chip faces the charge of supplying class A drugs. The issue, hotly denied by brothers Thariq and Sajit Mohammed who run the chippy, hinges on how much preparation went into the mushrooms before they were ladled out.


The Home Office explains to the Chronicle that the 12 varieties - with names like psilocybe semilanceata or liberty cap - may be legally sold "in their natural condition". But once cooked, dried out or even frozen, they can cause euphoria, hallucinations or just plain tummy ache and selling them becomes an offence.


Newcastle chip shops sound exciting places generally; the brothers already sell what the Chronicle describes, under the commendable headline "Fish and Trips" as "legal highs such as herbal ecstasy and amyl nitrate". There was a time when managing to persuade the fryer to ladle free scraps on your chips gave most people enough of a high. But we live in a more worldly world.

[fnord]

i dont see the difference between wet and dry,i mean wet mushrooms are more potent IMHO. might want to edit some junk out of this alfa

[geezaman]

Be interesiting if someone could post a follow up and whether the chipy is closed down or not.

[Barney]

Originally Posted by fnord

i dont see the difference between wet and dry,i mean wet mushrooms are more potent IMHO. might want to edit some junk out of this alfa

There isn't much difference, but at the time the article was published fresh mushrooms were legal in the UK. Psilocin/psilocybin were illegal, as were preparations containing them, but so long as the mushrooms were in their natural state they weren't considered a "preparation". Head shops all over the country were selling fresh mushrooms, so I'd imagine the chippy didn't get in any trouble for this, unless they were deep-frying their shrooms and serving them in a kebab!

[fnord]

i think if they were served with food they could easily be considered a preparation.

[Perception Addict]

though the web didn't give me much info on whether or not this place is still running, i did find a phone number online, and if someone from the uk was to call it we'd know its status.

[kbos2hm]

yep the happy chip is still open except its name has changed its still known as the happy chip but it called sajways i will refrain form reciting the inventory of the shop but it sell allsorts of things they still sell naturall highs so i am told