BURGER King's High Ousegate restaurant was covered in posters promoting their 'Fryday' - and nationwide the restaurants were expecting to give away three million portions of the new fries in just one day.

As our watches clicked on to 11am we entered to get our free lunch.

Approaching the counter we were greeted by the sight of seven or eight eager staff dressed in the promotional gear, and as their t-shirts noted, these were the 'Frying Squad'.

They seemed prepared for action, aware of the embarrassment suffered by McDonald's in its Big Mac crisis of earlier in the year.

A spokesman for Burger King pledged they would not be suffering the same fate as McDonalds.

He said: "After what happened to them recently, we would look even sillier if we were to run out today. Extra supplies have been brought in and mobile units have been strategically placed around the country to refill those stores who suffer a shortage of fries."

We were segregated from genuine customers by a sign reading Fries Only This Side and were sent to two of the end counters near the fryers where the helpful young ladies gave us our fries with no hint of argument or questions such as "anything else?".

Children were causing mayhem by attempting to collect as many packets as possible from all the different counters.

At first some of the greedy young things were successful, and one little boy was collared by a member of staff, only after he had managed to collect five bags of the new specially coated fries - and this was at 11.15am when the offer was only a quarter of an hour old.

By lunch-time the staff had got used to the tricks of the kids, and their attempts to get extra portions were greeted with an earnest: "We've already done you, sorry."

As they were walking out, the children retorted: "We'll come back in a few minutes."

The store was very busy and all the tables were full so a lot of people were taking their food out.

The store was still reasonably tidy and the staff seemed to be coping well.

Burger King claims its new fries are easier to prepare and serve in large quantities and it has secured massive supplies of fries to meet demand.

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