FAST food fans in a remote North-East village are celebrating the return of fish and chips - after a 50-year hiatus.

Caf owner Gordon Witton couldn't believe the residents of Rookhope, in Weardale, County Durham, hadn't savoured the taste of deep fried cod and chips for five decades.

He decided to do something about it and bought a mobile van, christened the Little Chippie.

Now, his regular visits are a local highlight with queues forming whenever he's "frying tonight".

Just yards away from his regular pitch is a garage and workshop, which was the last fish and chip shop in Rookhope until it closed 50 years ago.

Mr Witton, 53, has bags of the "old pioneering spirit" which he says was instilled in salesmen when he was a general manager at Binns store, in Newcastle.

"In those days we used to send out buyers to places like this to drum up orders," he said.

The Wittons have already enjoyed considerable success with their Little Chippie, in the nearby Weardale village of St John's Chapel, which they visit three times a week from their caf in Stanhope.

But Mr Witton said it was with some trepidation that they decided to take on the culinary challenge of paying a weekly visit to Rookhope.

With shops and other businesses closing up and down the dale, he believes mobile shops could be one way forward in rural areas.

"They are not faced with the burden of rates and other costs which are forcing other retail outlets out of business. Very few people will invest in shops these days because they are too expensive to run."

The Wittons' decision to boldly go where no one has gone before them, has won the approval of Durham county councillor John Shuttleworth, who lives in Rookhope, and whose family ran the last fish and chip shop in St John's Chapel, until it closed after a fire.

He said: "This is just the sort of enterprise we need here - somebody who's prepared to get up and have a go to provide a service in an isolated community."

But the Wittons have a lot to do if they hope to fully live up to the deep fried traditions of Rookhope - as 75-year-old Jean Roddam explained when she cast her mind back to the fare served up in the village 50 years ago.

She said: "They used to charge tuppence for a fish and a penny for a bag of chips - and you had to be there early, as they often got sold out.

"They were lovely fish and chips.