Is the Great British bake off really this bad?

The episode was fine.

While the Daily Beast author bemoans GBBO hosts and contestants ignorance of Mexico, she is herself ignorant of the sturdy British habit of pronouncing all foreign words as if they were English.

More glockmolo please … from well peeled avocados.

Not sure if that's a good habit R1. It smacks of cultural ignorance but I'm from Texas and we use proper pronunciation from country of origin.

What's the deal with the bitch drowning kittens.

The English are so embarrassingly retrograde.

Makes me glad I gave up on it.

r2 has never met Peggy Hill.

R3, her mother made her drown kittens when she was 11, it traumatized her. She's not a sociopath.

More white people getting offended on behalf of the poor downtrodden minorities.

Actual Mexicans don't care about this.

I don't care if they're not offended R8. It offends me.

I've stated my boundaries.

Mexico is not adjacent to the UK like it is to the US.

People in the US just don't understand that the whole world isn't the US.

Get. Over. It.

I'm going to assume they made pheasant tacos in yorkshire pudding tortillas topped with mushy peas.

More self-righteous indignation. That Daily Beast writer = Humorless Prisspot.

R10, non sequitur. This has nothing to do with that. Brits refuse to pronounce anything not English correctly.

The most disappointing thing about The Great British Baking Show is that Matt Lucas doesn't make his appearance dressed as Bubbles Devere every episode.

[quote]Brits refuse to pronounce anything not English correctly.

paaaaasta

Prue is a silly old Tory and Brexiteer. Her son is even worse. Reason enough to hate her.

That Paul Hollywood is annoying.

Yes, but I’d still fuck him.

Th fangs are out.

The media has to stop. These complaints are why people are increasingly hating the left.

Not sure which is more cringeworthy, the Mexican episode or humor-impaired Americans getting offended on behalf of Mexicans over the Mexican episode.

People really don't know how to just let the small things slide these days, do they?

I don't think many in the UK were offended by the content, more that it's just shit and not funny.

It just made the show look stupid.

That no one even stopped to say, "Hey, that's not how you pronounce 'taco!'"

Do they mispronounce all the French, German, and Swedish dishes as well? (That is not a rhetorical question. Most of those I never heard of before so I have no idea.)

The English no KNOWING about the Americas

humor-impaired Americans

Typical British entitled cunt, many Americans ARE of Mexican heritage, go brush your tackos out of your brown rotten teeth.

R26 They have pudding teeth.

By the way is Britain really as diverse as the casts for this show? Each season it seems half the cast is asian or black.

R28 Or purple/pink haired.

they usually included a retard, amputee, and midget too on most shows.

The pic at OP doesn't really look appetizing at all.

Many of the British expats I've ever met love Mexican food.

Yeah, R32. I worked with some and they fucking loved it and Tex-Mex and some of the ones who returned but still visit demand it as soon as they step off the plane. They just don't do well cooking it themselves.

R32 Everyone loves mexican food.

R34, now I'm curious to try Mexican food in England.

Never satisfy that curiosity, R35.

It used to be hard finding it outside of the Texas to CA areas. My brother was in Canada and said they had no clue how to cook decent Mexican despite restaurants being around.

Imperialism in baking competition format.

They could have baked pan dulce. Mexico has a lot of traditional baked goods. What about bolillos?

Gotta admit, those steak tacos looked good, especially the overloaded ones that Paul and Prue bitched about.

R28 12% of the UK population are ethnically from India/Pakistan.

We also have sizable populations from other EU Counties, It's really not unusual to see non white Brits on TV.

Even Prue Leith was born in South Africa, she didn't come to the UK until she was 20.

The funniest part to me was Paul's diktat that the tres leches cakes had to be at least four layers tall and that leakage was verboten.

Sure, I guess, if you've decided that tres leches is an appropriate cake for stacking. Made the Mexican way, the layers would collapse into a pile of mush. It's a single-layer cake for a reason.

But Paul went to Mexico once, so....

R26, Actually, I'm an American, specifically a Californian, and much of the "outrage" was from white millennials on Twitter--the same types who use "Latinx" without having a clue why it's offensive.

Mexicans have other things to worry about--fortunately, both our neighbors have good senses of humor--you'd need it being next to the nuttiness of the U.S.

The UK is in Europe--a relatively small area with dozens of different cultures and languages--are you really that surprised that the Brits change the pronunciation of non-English words?

[quote] It used to be hard finding it outside of the Texas to CA areas.

South America, a little surprisingly, has pretty atrocious Mexican food.

Lol did he actually want a 4 layer tres leches cake? Oy vey. This guy doesn't have a fucking clue.

I have many many Mexican relatives and friends. I travel to Mexico frequently to visit them. Not one of them would take the slightest offense at an English person mispronouncing the name of a Mexican dish. On the contrary they’d find it cute or amusing.

R46, I used to have a job where I worked with a lot of Latina nannies and their charges. I remember one of them telling me that they thought it was funny when Americans tried to speak Spanish, "It sounds like singing."

R44, I'm not surprised--Latin America has a bunch of its own cultural/social tensions that we Anglophones tend to not really notice. Mexicans are both looked down upon and envied--it's a little strange. In my somewhat limited experience, though, Mexican cuisine's one of the better ones south of the border, way better than Costa Rica's, say. Peru also has excellent food.

[quote]Gotta admit, those steak tacos looked good,

They really don't.

Those steak tacos looked like space aliens attempting and failing to reconstitute Mexican food.

[quote]They could have baked pan dulce. Mexico has a lot of traditional baked goods. What about bolillos?

Apparently you didn't watch the show. The first challenge was pan dulce. And most of the versions they produced were so elaborate and over-the-top and unlike anything I've ever seen before. And I live in southern California.

Those steak tacos look like nothing I've seen here.

R46, but a host on a baking show mispronouncing the dish they are making?

And demanding one be made as a layer cake when it is always single layer because it cannot stack?

I do not think anyone is offended. We are just disappointed because it looks like the hosts, judges, an, and producers of the show do not have a clue what they are doing.

[quote] We are just disappointed because it looks like the hosts, judges, an, and producers of the show do not have a clue what they are doing.

This is it. Just like the embarrassment when they did Japanese week with noting remotely Japanese. They should just stick to baking with rosewater and passion fruit and stop embarrassing themselves.

This page has the pan dulce that they made.

They tend to be good at making authentic French and Italian food, other than that they are doing British versions of foreign cuisine.

I don’t know a single Mexican household in which bread or pasties are made. I know of only 2 things that are baked, a traditional Lenten bread pudding and flan. For everything else, a trip to a bakery.

Sandro made his cake Mexican by adding a huge black mustache. Or maybe he's just a really big fan of Pringles.

R57 That Brazilian fucker was kind of insulting half hazardly throwing fiesta colors all over his cake, putting chili in it and then sticking a mariachi pedro mustache on it. He’s the one that should have at least had an idea of doing something Mexican. They are able to go home and use google during taping for christsakes! If it was a china challenge he would added a fu manchu mustache and hoisin , I am sure.

R47, I love visiting South America, but outside of Peru, I do find a lot of the food a bit lacking in heat and flavor. I think it doesn't totally help that a lot of tourists expect somewhat bold, Mexican-adjacent flavors.

Excellent fruit and juices though!

True R59. The only country that might be comparable might be Brazil IMO.

I would have put a tres leches cake in a pinata. And have Matt Lucas try to poke it from four feet below.

Sandro is from Brazil? No wonder I thought that mustache was inspired by his pubic hair.

Someone suggested that Sandro should have turned the mustache upside down and made it a tribute to Frida Kahlo's uni-brow.

Kevin: “Ancho chili is dangerous, so we’ll be going easy.”

And there is it is, right in the middle of the green row.

Paul treats the young attractive male bakers different than the others. It’s odd. Rob from season 2 for instance Paul acted like his daddy.

In alot of season 2 episodes Paul looked like he wanted to put Rob over his knee and spank his bare bottom.

Aren't ancho chiles slightly sweet and mild?

Yes, anchos are dried poblanos. They aren't spicy at all.

R56 I know that bread pudding you're talking about, it's great. You're right not nobody bakes at home, that's why there are panaderías everywhere in the Southwest.

I’ve had a layered Tres Lechesi…and it was fucking awesome.

R60: Brazil is nothing like Mexico--the culture is rooted in Portugal and Africa , with more recent migrants from Italy and Germany. The national dish resembles nothing in the rest of the Americas (Farofa, with a starch unlike anything anywhere else).

"The British only know three vegetables and two of them are cabbage."

They've done some spectacular fuck ups of French food, but that's par for the course so no one pays any attention.

So I watched it last night. The pan dulce competition was interesting; they'd actually done their research - they were high-end pan dulces. The taco and tres leches, not so interesting. ("I've flown an aeroplane to Mexico! I'm an expert!")

[quote]Paul treats the young attractive male bakers different than the others. It’s odd. Rob from season 2 for instance Paul acted like his daddy.

I've observed the opposite. There is always a young, attractive young woman there. When Sue was on the show, she showed extra attention to them, but Paul used to lust for them. There were rumors that one of them hooked up with Paul. I don't remember her name, but she was a tough brunette who behaved as if she put out of anyone.

It should've been canceled after Mary, Sue, and Mel left. It's been unwatchable since.

Mary, Sue, and Mel were insufferable twats.

One Prue is greater than all of them.

Those people don't have a fucking clue what hot and spicy. Anchos hot?

Speaking of peppers, I just diced a jalapeño and still have juice on my hands even after washing. Dumbass me now has burning lips from touching them inadvertently. Last time I got it in my eyes.

Dona Angela should have been guest judge, and promptly shamed them all, especially that pinche chingada fraud Paul Hollywood.

I think he was referring to ancho chile POWDER, not the actual chiles. And since it's concentrated, it can be quite hot.

Love it R79.

Ancho powder is between 1,000 and 1,500 SHU.

For reference, cayenne powder is between 30,000 to 50,000.

[quote]The flavor of ancho chili powder can be described as mildly fruity; in fact, ancho chiles are considered the sweetest of all the dried chiles. In addition to being sweet, their flavor is also smoky with subtle earthy notes. Ancho powder is only mildly hot (between 1,000 to 1,500 on the Scoville scale) which makes it perfect for layering with other flavors. It’s very family-friendly. It can be paired with cumin, cinnamon, and cilantro.

People went bonkers when 2 ladies opened a food truck business selling street tacos & became successful. The "masses" weren't satisfied until these 2 women closed their business & begged for forgiveness across their social media platforms. Netflix (or which streamer I watched it on escapes me) features with accolades an Asian restaurateur who specializes in pizza. Where's the public breakdown over her obvious appropriation of Italian culture? I'm not suggesting there should be any at all for anyone who's inspired by whatever happens to inspires them, but this selective outrage over is counterproductive, humorless & utterly unnecessary.

And as far as pronunciation...Are we really willing to discount honest respect and cultural appreciation for they way words are pronounced? Surely there are more effective power-grabs to reach for, since that's all these arguments are really about. Different people with different accents & speech patterns pronounce words differently--it's not exclusive to people who speak English as a first language. While I was teaching at a community I had a student who would get on my case at every attendance call over the pronunciation of her name. She'd waste time every single class making me repeat her name after her direction, which I played along with. I'd let my students call me by my first name, which she never made any effort to get right. Never once did I deviate from my original way of pronouncing her name because I said it just like her every single fucking time. I had other students who grew tired of the game & one morning a true joy of student, who was Jamaican & spoke with a very heavy accent, spoke up with "Hey, you, his name is ____! (saying my name in a very blunt CNY accent) It's not ____! (saying my name the way this student pronounced it) You ever gonna get that right before wasting anymore of my time?" The student was shocked, but never mentioned the pronunciation of her name again. But it wasn't about the proper pronunciation of her name to begin with. It about the power she possessed making a ridiculous issue of it, much like the argument articles like this present. They just intimidate people from appreciating other cultures at all.

While I was teaching at a community COLLEGE...

R75 - Lottie, series 11.

Thank you, R 85. It was Lottie.

[quote] "Mary, Sue, and Mel were insufferable twats"

We're clearly of opposing opinions R77, and that's okay. That said, Prue is just...meh. Plain oatmeal. But the one I CANNOT stand is Noah Fielding. I'm still trying to figure out why this wannabe Russell Brand ever became popular to begin with.

I miss the first three quite a bit.

R78 Mix salt with the soap when you wash your hands and it'll get it all off.

It was cue wheb Sue lusted over the neuratic Ruby, the pretty biracial contestant in series 4? Or 5? They would have made a cute couple.

Ruby and Sue, Ruby and Mary, Ruby and Matt; anything but Ruby and Paul.

[quote]ahhhhhh a peacocking manchild lingering wherever the money is, i am shocked

[quote]this, from a man who turned up to work revving a rental lamborghini. or was it a ferrari. i don't remember, the air was thick w testosterone

[quote]call me ishmael. my child, it was a dark time: shirts tucked into bootcut jeans and the season's first dusting of spray tan on the ground...

[quote]we locked in battle with a mythic beast, both bright white and mahogany, man and baby, ego and terrible, terrible fragility all at once. — Ruby Tandoh (@rubytandoh) September 22, 2016

I agree with r75 . Noel does it too. Both Noel and Paul wanted to bang Alice. It was obvious.

Paul being "nice" to cute ladies:

Season 4 - Ruby

Season 10 - Alice, Priya, Steph

Season 11 - Crystelle

If they are cute and skinny Paul will lurk around them.

Thanks R88. I'll try it.

r87 Noel, not Noah.

Paul did act paternal to Rob and Henry. Maybe not in a overtly sexual way but it was noticeable. I find it interesting Paul only does with the cute young guys.

[quote] "[R87] Noel, not Noah."

I stand corrected, R93. But he's still obnoxious and woefully unfunny.

This week's Extra Slice.

The episode was just so CRINGE.

Seriously, the show should just be canceled. In every way on every level.

Is being showily horrified by Britain and Britishness having a moment in the US or something? Any other country would be easier to take shit from but AMERICA? Did you pick the UK because it's the only nation that may, possibly, at certain times of the year and from certain perspectives, compare slightly to your own for general insularity and embarrassing lack of knowledge of everything outside its own borders?

I get that there have been some moments of real lameness on GBBO but to be honest the lameness is part of the appeal for a lot of people. It's just the TV version of easy listening. For the record I haven't watched it for years because it's crap but the shrieking and offense being taken is so stupid. No one is trying to be offensive or hurt people's feelings. Quite the opposite. Don't you have real racists to expose?

R98, the entire episode was excruciatingly racist.

And the whole country is going down the tubes all on its own. Each new PM is an order of magnitude worse than the last, and the new King is a fucking asshole, BREXIT was a self-inflicted wound on par with the US's election of Trump, but at least the US rectified that mistake.

And this show was just the most CRINGE of anything I've seen... I can't believe they weren't too embarrassed to even air it. It was awful. Don't sit here judging us if you didn't see it.

R97 95 percent of the cringe comes from the ugly hosts. Change them or bring back Sue and Mel and everything will be alright.

Sue and Mel were, and are, dumb.

Sue and Mel were great hosts for the show, which was meant to be benign, goofy fun. They got rid of all the good people and kept the sex pest who doesn't know as much about food as he claims he does, and it's not fun anymore.

Just like German media pulls back from anything that might possibly maybe be close to anti-Semitism, British media ought to consider doing the same with xenophobia and racism.

The racism I saw on the streets of Britain (I was there for a month just before the pandemic), was shocking. As one British collogue said to me, since they had built their wealth on seizing the resources of their colonies, the British had to look down on other to maintain their own self respect.

I do not know if I would go so far, but the Brits seem blithely unaware of how the rest of the world sees them.

[quote]Netflix (or which streamer I watched it on escapes me) features with accolades an Asian restaurateur who specializes in pizza. Where's the public breakdown over her obvious appropriation of Italian culture?

Pizza is just a flatbread with toppings, which is common in a lot of early cultures across the globe, including many Asian areas.

You're hyperventilating over David Chang, right? He's American. He was born in Virginia. He travels all over, including to Italy, to taste test pizzas. You're being a fucking asshole racist dumbfuck with your post, and I wish people like you were capable of either learning or shame, because this weird thoughtless purgatory you live in is pathetic.

R103 British wealth was not from the colonies. It mainly came from The Industrial Revolution (and a pirate called Sir Francis Drake).

I worked with some ex-pats who were shockingly condescending and rude to waitstaff at an Indian restaurant we went to. I was appalled and apologized for them to the manager and left an extra big tip for the waitstaff.

British ex-pats can be weird. Often they leave the UK because they are arseholes who want total freedom of speech without any restrictions.

That doesn't exist for them here, you can't be racist, homophobic or discriminatory without legal consequences.

R105, just what reality are you in? The British industrial revolution was financed by the slave cotton from America, you are stupid. It started in the cotton mills in Manchester, cotton was the first "industry".

Try again, the British raped the world, then needed America to save them from Germany. You know it's true even if it's always denied.

This primitive mud person is triggered ^

So what does all of this shit have to do with the program?

I just want to give Sandro a blow job. I'll keep watching this season as long as Sandro sticks around.

i think they gave him a gold star to stay this week.

on the clump.

rainbow hair is gone.

Advice for future contestants if you want to stay a few weeks longer than your baking skills warrant, wear a Hajib or Kufi. It works everytime.

R108 Pretty sure steam engines didn't use much cotton, there is more than weaving involved in The British Industrial Revolution. Everything came about because of the steam engine.

R104...I was actually referring to Ann Kim, who's quite sharp in her articulation of how cross-cultural her culinary approach is. Growing up Korean she found her inspiration for her unique pizza concept in the pizza shops of NYC. Your reactionary post indicates that your really misunderstood mine, which was actually reaffirming & supporting the approach of someone like Kim, rather than the people who would accuse her of appropriation because she is very cross-cultural. Clearly, as she states herself, her inspiration to put kimchee on a pizza came from an Italian shop.

Also, your point that David Chang, who I was not referring to, is American is moot. Plenty of Americans of a specific ethnicity are accused daily by other Americans of other ethnicities of appropriation. So really, you said nothing in your attempt to set me straight. You just needed the few minutes satisfaction of calling me a racist.

R114 I suggest you do a Google search, you shouldn't spout off when you are ignorant.

[quote]Advice for future contestants if you want to stay a few weeks longer than your baking skills warrant, wear a Hajib or Kufi. It works everytime.

Or be a "pretty" young woman for Paul to ogle over.

R112 You are a cunt spoiling it for Americans.They don’t get the new episode till Friday.

Quote a single "excruciatingly racist" thing from the episode, R99.

Oh for fuck's sake, the GBBO is fine. Prue is fine, Paul is fine, Noel and Matt are fine, the baking contestants are all fine.

I preferred it with Mary, Sue and Mel but it's fucking FINE. I don't expect British people to know diddlysquat about Mexican food. I'm from New England and when I was a kid there was no Mexican food. I tried it as an adult in Texas and loved it. Went back home and they allegedly had it but it was still shit. Tortillas and ketchup.

The GBBO is a nice little show. It's relaxing, it's often amusing, it's corny and cute and it's just a fucking baking show. Leave it alone.

Noel and Matt suck , deal with it.

[quote]Sandro is from Brazil?

Angola

I love GBBO. It's inoffensive, it has exposed me to lots of regional British accents I've never heard much of through British media, and to lots of bizarre (to me) baked things I never knew existed.

It's so interesting that the US was founded by Brits and we inherited things from the British colonists like...well, slavery, but their food is utterly foreign and vice versa.

I've followed a few of the bakers on Instagram, and I am a but surprised to see some of their private lives. I don't think of GBBO contestants as typical attention-hungry reality TV stars but some are. This one, Tom, just posted a Marks & Spencer promotion with a redheaded "London NHS doctor/OBGYN/aesthetic doctor 💉/aspiring THOT" and seminude Instaho and Drag Race UK 'Brit Crew' model.

R123 He’s got a nice dick though. His nudes leaked.

R124 Tom?

R125 Yep Tom Hetherington, I saw in one of the GBBO threads at lpsg. Big uncut cock (shaved pubes though). Nice ass too.

Quite the slut, that Tom.

R127 He he a slut bottom or slut top though?

A slut is a slut is a slut.

R128 He's very...outgoing. I've got a hunch he likes to be among many lads and to play every role. Someone who likes to fill choux buns with pastry cream while simultaneously sampling others' filling confections.

[quote] And the whole country is going down the tubes all on its own. Each new PM is an order of magnitude worse than the last, and the new King is a fucking asshole, BREXIT was a self-inflicted wound on par with the US's election of Trump, but at least the US rectified that mistake.

This, coming from a country which saw its Capitol be stormed by the worst possible people imaginable, at the behest of a Head of State who could not string a coherent sentence together in any language, is quite hilarious.

And you may have got rid of him (at least for the time being) but the GOP remains terrified of him and has been remade in his image because there are tens of millions who were willing to vote for him precisely because he despises Mexicans (amongst many others).

[quote] I do not know if I would go so far, but the Brits seem blithely unaware of how the rest of the world sees them.

I could say the same about the United States, a country founded on genocide, theft, slavery and racism, both pre and post-Revolution.

The original hit its stride and had a certain energy that is missing whenever I watch the current show, which seems flat much like a party that has failed to take off. Mary and Paul had a nice back and forth, which was mostly Mary's doing. Mary came from a posh-ish background but lived through the shortages of WWII and the decade after and could be both a bit patrician but also at ease with many different kinds of people. Prue just seems like a stuffy, social climbing home ec teacher. Noel is too goofy for the show, even though they have reigned in some of his interpersonal weirdness. Sandi was nice enough but too bland, while Matt is too immature to be taken seriously.

You could say the same about every country, r132.

There was always someone there before who isn't there now.

It was a way cringe episode but I wasn’t offended.

[quote]Prue just seems like a stuffy, social climbing home ec teacher.

Hot!

R132 I am not taking a holier-than-thou position as an American who has never felt particularly proud of being American—but I do have limited patience for British people who hold their noses and point fingers while invoking 'American slavery,' genocide and the rest.

American slavery is British slavery. Slavery was brought to Jamestown, Virginia in the 1600s where there was no such thing as an American. The settlers were British colonists who were here on an economic enterprise for Great Britain. British people purchased human beings, chained them up in ships and towed them to North America.

British colonists were the first to encounter, exploit and kill indigenous American Indian people. Every cultural value held by American settlers in this area were British values.

The Puritans of New England were different. They were outcast religious fanatics in Britain and you could say they did not embody British values as it were, but the people who came to Virginia and North Carolina were British people who came here for money, who used forced slave labor to make money for the crown, who looked down upon 'savage' indigenous people, and who were proudly British. They lived in Jamestown on the James River, bith named for their king, and among many other atrocities, they abducted a young native girl, forced her to marry a British man and they imported her back to Britain to parade around as a savage novelty (as was the wont of Britons and other neighboring Europeans of the era), where she died of disease and her life story was rewritten as the story of a savage princess who was tamed by genteel white men.

Your home country is encased by glass. Don't throw stones.

American slavery was a British design. Early American racism was British racism before anyone came up with the name America.

But how about those tacos, huh?

[quote] Your home country is encased by glass. Don't throw stones.

R137, I can turn this statement back at you, and your absurd attempt to blame Britain for slavery and racism in America. That might fly up until the Revolution, but thereafter it is all on those Founding Fathers and those who followed them. Thats kind of what independence means.

You said above that Brits would be surprised what the world really thinks of us. That’s true for most nations which have wielded any power in the world, including your own.

And to emphasize I'm not saying the above to say 'you're worse than we are,' my father's side of the family has been in coastal North Carolina since the 1600s, and they were farmers and undoubtedly slave holders early on who lost everything during the Depression. That family came here from Britain as British colonists to farm tobacco to export back to Great Britain. We are both guilty by heritage and culture.

The other side of my family is mixed but primarily were Irish refugees who came to Pennsylvania during the famine in the 1800s.

If you want to talk about contemporary and recent demonstrations of national values of racism, we could talk about Great Britain's attempt to commit Irish genocide while calling it a natural famine.

In US terms, it's almost unthinkable to think this way, but while visiting Ireland and learning about how the British have depicted Irish people as apes, how British politicians laughed at starving Irish people as they exported what little food they had to the UK, and how British politicians said that Irish mass deaths were god's will, and learning that a Turkish sultan sent a shipload of food to Ireland to save lives and Queen Victoria forced it to turn around and go back, I had this conflicted feeling about my own identity, that I am about half British and about half Irish, a little alarming given what the British have done to the Irish. I thought 'this must be what it feels like to be black in the US and know you have white DNA from the rape of your ancestors by men who owned them.'

But my father gave me a reality check. We visited Ireland in 2017. We were in an exhibition about the great famine, learning for the first time how much the British government had to do with the million-plus deaths and the million refugees who left, dropping the country's population from 8 million to 6 million. I said 'I can't believe I used to be an anglophile,' and my dad said, 'Don't hate the British. That doesn't make any sense. Don't forget what our country is doing right now. There are kids locked up in cages and some have died there from exposure and starvation. It's not British people you should hate; if you hate anyone, just hate all people.'

And he is right, ultimately.

There is no human culture that has not committed atrocious crimes against humanity.

Anyone who points fingers at another country and claims they're worse is ignorant of their own history.

R139 I am not absolving American people of our role as commercializing slavery and making it an explicitly and solely racially motivated crime against humanity.

I am pointing out correctly that the concept is a concept of British origin based in British values. It was British businessmen who came up with the idea as an economic model. American businessmen continued the model after British people discontinued it.

Of course, American businesses at the time were entirely dependent on the model for their businesses and their survival on this continent, whereas Brits lost their colonies in this continent and therefore really had no economic motivation to continue supporting enslavement.

To pretend that the US version of slavery was not created by Brits is to deny objective truth.

To pretend that American people did not self-assign the right to do this and worse to whole groups of human beings is to deny the objective truth.

To pretend British people were morally superior to reject slavery when they had no further ecnomic use for slavery is to show bias toward British political interests and to give politicians the benefit of the doubt, which I find pretty laughable. Politicians exploit and are by nature, more often than not, morally and ethically flexible and they do what is in the interests of bank accounts only. That's universal. It applies to American, British, Irish, Guatemalan, Russian and all other political operatives who write laws and set moral cultural norms while routinely behaving immorally in their own self-interests.

Anyone want some pico de gallo?

[quote] Anyone want some pico de gallo?

Is that Spanish for Yorkshire pudding?

Picko de callo!

"The tacko is pretty good, but there's too much salt in it. The topics are pretty good, though."

"I've got to make the whack a moley kwockalockamoo next."

R140 get over yourself. You were alarmed that you have some Irish DNA when you realised how Ireland had been treated? News flash: millions and millions of English people have Irish DNA too, and vice versa. You’re an American. Nothing more.

Jesus christ, can we get back to the fucking cakes now?

R140, what on earth do you mean “In US terms, it’s almost unthinkable to think this way”? At the same time as the UK was inflicting famine on ireland, the US government was ethnically cleansing that half of the United States which hadn’t already been ethnically cleansed of the native population it viewed as savages.

[quote] Jesus christ, can we get back to the fucking cakes now?

Sorry, r148, you’re right. - I honestly would rather be discussing Devon scones and mille-feuille!

R149 I meant that the American slavery institution is so dominant in our culture that it feels practically blasphemous to relate being half-and-half Irish and British with being half-and-half African and European in the US, in consideration of having an 'oppressor' and 'the oppressed' coexisting in our ancestry.

And speaking of ancestry, my Irish side is 'purely' Irish, very specifically from one region of County Mayo, which both Ancestry DNA and 23andMe precisely zoom in on. My other side is 'Great Britain' predominantly (about equal mixes of Scottish and English with some Welsh), and trace amounts of Scandinavian, France/Germany/Liechtenstein/Switzerland.

23andMe also says I am 2% Neanderthal, which adds a little interest into the mix, and 0.2% Coptic Egyptian, which probably is wrong but I think is really cool and I will therefore always claim!

this thread is evidence that the person who starts a thread should be able to mute people who are going off-topic - get on it, muriel

who the fuck cares about america in a thread about a baking show in the uk

The worst thing about this was the resulting explosions in Mexico and destruction and death that followed. And the mass executions.

Oh wait, none of that happened? I’m mixing it up with Ukraine? And this is just slightly cringe but adults might just raise an eyebrow but get on with their lives instead of melting down? Oh ok.

I don't understand why people start shrieking that a show MUST be canceled because they don't love everything about it. Why don't they just stop watching and let everyone else get on with it? Let the ratings decide when enough is enough.

I'm not a fan of Noel and Matt, I don't think every challenge is a winner, but so what? The show is still a pleasant escape for an hour from the miserable state of the world . An Extra Slice is pure fluff, but I always get a few genuine laughs out of it. What would these shows be replaced with? Nothing much better, I'm sure.

If people want to watch the show, fine. But for Paul to judge anything related to food/baking when he is so clearly ignorant on the proper way to prepare national dishes is, shall we say, "amusing". He is no expert. He knows English baking and should stick to what he knows.

No, he isn't an expert! I agree! The solution is to just not watch the show if that irritates you, and not go pissing and moaning about "racism" (there was none in the episode and my invitation for an above poster to quote any stands).

0.2% this, 5% that and yet somehow 100% American, R151.

[quote]We are both guilty by heritage and culture.

There is no guilt by heritage and culture. And if there is, almost everyone on earth is guilty.

Mexico is just Mexico to Brits, a faraway foreign country. They don't have a large minority population of Mexican-Americans nor do they have a massive contingent of migrants crossing the border. It isn't a political issue for them. It's just a country where people wear sombreros. The equivalent would be an American cooking show about Austrian food pointing out their fondness for lederhosen and being considered to be racist.

Pru is like some gay porn star, the less you know about her, her opinions, her private life, her past, her family, the better.

That's when you still can enjoy her "soggy bottoms" moments on the show.

Pray tell, what imprudent perniciousness did Prue perpetrate in her past?

[qoute]Quote a single "excruciatingly racist" thing from the episode

The fact that you didn't catch any of the grotesque racism kinda makes me think you're pretty racist yourself.

I'll leave the racism accusations to people of Mexican descent to comment on, and I can forgive the British mispronunciations, but a contestant and Prue both thinking a tortilla is a taco and the 'filling' is just...'filling' on top of a 'taco' bread. I mean, cuckoo. That's embarrassingly ignorant for a show that chose a tortilla as a featured 'baked good.'

That's equivalent to mistaking pie crust alone for a pie. Very weird.

Paul did that throughout.

"The corn flavor coming from the taco is perfect. Blended with all the fillings on top, it's a delicious eat."

"The filling is okay, but the taco was overcooked."

"Beautifully filled; the taco was really good; the seasoning was good as well."

Prue's contribution was something like:

"I'll tell you where the salt is coming from: it's coming from the taco!"

Haven't been in the UK since before the pandemic. I went to a supposedly Mexican restaurant in London last time I was there and it was crap. Can't remember the name.

Part of the problem - I'm from Texas and living in Europe I really missed TexMex - is that you can't get masa harina over there, no fresh tortillas like at HEB, everything's canned - El Paso brand which is awful. You can get fresh jalapenos or at least equivalent hot peppers. Creme fraiche substitutes for crema. Mild Cheddar works out pretty well to replace Monterrey Jack, but no equivalent of cotija. But you're really stuck when it comes to tortillas and you can't make Mexican food without them.

[quote]But you're really stuck when it comes to tortillas and you can't make Mexican food without them.

Just substitute tacos!

Why is this whole concept a thing?

"Wahaca," because "Oaxaca" was never going to fly.

Wa-HACK-a

[quote] It smacks of cultural ignorance but I'm from Texas and we use proper pronunciation from country of origin.

I'm also from Texas and I call bullshit on that. The only reason we use more or less correct Spanish pronunciation is that we're right next to Mexico. Do we use correct Nigerian, Chinese, Vietnamese, or French pronunciation? Hardly.

TACKOS and FADGEETAHS!

Putting the guacamole in first was a CRIME AGAINST NATURE. It's a TOPPING.

[quote] The fact that you didn't catch any of the grotesque racism kinda makes me think you're pretty racist yourself.

So you can't quote any racism from the episode then, R161. And have gone for the ol' "I can't back up my claim so you're a bigot!" gambit.

(Rolling eyes at R171, who mindlessly parrots the racist response to all accusations of racism)

You think all racism is explicitly verbal, don't you? If they don't say the N-Word, they can't be racist, right?

(rolling eyes again)

The GBBO is all about good natured, self-deprecating, humorous take on life – no wonder self-proclaimed woke people, just as they may be, are not able to get it. That particular show was not about Mexico – it was about lighthearted take on the way Brits clumsily perceive it – so mispronunciation and culinary cluelessness were a welcome must.

Excuse me but Paul Just Got Back from Mexico! He knows all about TAY-cos

I’m offended so it must no longer exist!

Yeah again though, R172, what racist thing happened in the show?

What is truly tragic is that Matt Lucas who was brilliant as Vicky Pollard and I'm the Only Gay in this Village on Little Britain is stuck mugging on a cooking show.

Matt Lucas was wonderful as The Only Gay but he is abysmal as a wise-cracking host. They need to get new hosts. Soon.

And they should dump kitten-hating Prue, who has all the charm and charisma of a stale after-dinner mint.

I mostly like the whole cast. Noel and Matt annoy me as much as they mildly amuse me, but I feel like that's intentional. The women cohosts annoyed me, too. (Although I kind of loved Sandi. She seemed huggable.)

The only one who grates on me is Paul, but he is the anchor of the show. His handshake gimmick is awful IMO, and he seems to really be the only person whose judgment matters. His handshake is the ultimate compliment, and by designing the show that way, it means that Prue's or anyone else's opinions are meaningless.

The GBBO is all about good natured, self-deprecating, humorous take on life

Fuck you, you limey cunt. The Brits have been doing that forever all over the world.

I preferred the show when it was Mary Berry chastising Paul.

R164 You can buy Monterey Jack cheese in every supermarket in the UK, not sure how popular it is though?

Maybe kids like it?

A "street taco" is just a flat tortilla with stuff on it.

R180, I think it might be time for you to step away from this thread. It's clearly causing you a lot more stress than it's worth.

[quote]Oh for fuck's sake, the GBBO is fine. Prue is fine, Paul is fine, Noel and Matt are fine, the baking contestants are all fine.

The contestants may be fine, but Sandro is FINE.

R185 Balding Sandro aint all that hot.

I watched today and imagined myself wrapped up in Sandro’s arms and figuring out how to steam his pud.

R185 I am pretty sure his puds is self steaming.

Janusz is a cute and handsome chub.

ewwww

I first watched the show during the pandemic lockdown. For several seasons, half the bakers used pistachio, rose water, marzipan and mango in almost everything they made. I don't really like any of those flavors in baked goods and so they all stood out to me. I assumed these must be staple British flavors. But I am watching this week's episode and I just realized people have abandoned all of these, at least for this season. Were those just fad foods in the UK or what? It was annoying to me that literally half of the episodes for several seasons featured bakers using pistachio and the judges going "Ooh! PISTACHIO! VERY CLEVVAH!"

Is the jury still out on Abdul's orientation?

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗚𝘂𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗶𝘀 𝗢𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗱

“Because of what’s happening in the culinary scene in London, people’s minds are being opened to what real Mexican food is, then The Great British Bake Off comes and kicks that back 10 years. It’s almost as though no research or respect was shown to the culture and cuisine,” he said.

R191 Also fucking Matcha. It tastes awful they kept using it.

Yes, R194, forgot about that one. Many if the contestants even wince when they have to work with it. I think last season, everyone had to use it when they made the green stacked crêpe cakes, and Noel gagged when he smelled it being mixed.

If the bakers just made chocolate chip cookies and apple pie it wouldn’t be a very interesting show. They obviously make some effort to stand out from the stuff that we all make at home every week. Rosewater, pistachio, mango and matcha are not “traditional” in the UK either, but a lot of people will have bought a bottle of rosewater once to make some kind of vaguely Middle Eastern or Moroccan recipe - probably an Ottolenghi recipe from the Saturday Guardian - and then the rest of the bottle sits there for 15 years. And places like Marrakech and Istanbul are popular destinations only a short flight away, so those flavours are perhaps less alien here than they would be to someone in Kansas.

R196 It doesn't bother me that they're used at all, just notable to me that they were used during several seasons as frequently as flour, sugar and butter were used, and now they've all but disappeared. I get that they're varying from chocolate chips and brown sugar, but it's funny to me—somehow, the repetition of unusual ingredients in this way emphasizes to me how few ingredients there are to bake with at all. I'm so used to common ingredients that I don't think about them being used so often, but when it's pistachio, sultanas, pistachio, sultanas, pistachio, sultanas, pistachio, sultanas, I end up thinking, "CAN'T YOU USE SOMETHING ELSE ALREADY?!"

The show obviously run its course, but it's still a money spinner.

I still like it, R98.

Years ago, my DVR was loaded up with recordings of two trash shows—Real Housewives and Ancient Aliens (I KNOW!!!)—that were mindlessly amusing. I played them allll the time for background noise and little chuckles.

The whole Bravo empire suddenly turned my stomach at some point and I adopted Drag Race for the same purpose, having scores of episodes saved on my DVR and playing them all the time.

Now I am cable free and GBBO streams in heavy rotation. It's a step up from any of those other shows. It's cute, mildly amusing, comforting. Nothing toxic about it except the thoughtlessness of watching it.

The Guardian doesn’t understand that GBBO doesn’t represent the British culinary scene…it represents the every person, marginally talented home baker. I’m sure the culinarily scene in London will survive the great Mexican taco incident just fine.

R200 The greatest offense to me from that show is how Brits say "tacko." I generally like British accents, but tack-oh? Cmon.

R199 is why we can't have nice things.

I hear Kate loves Mexican dick.

[quote]The greatest offense to me from that show is how Brits say "tacko." I generally like British accents, but tack-oh? Cmon.

You’ll survive and the people of Mexico will survive.

It's interesting that this mangled-Mexican epside is getting so much attention and heat.

I just watched an episode from last season—"Japanese week." Oh boy. Two contestants admitted they made Chinese food, and the judges who normally insist on going by the book noted no difference between Chinese food and Japanese food. Two contestants made Indian-style curries. Again, it occurred to no one that India and China are, like, not Japan *at all.*

But there was no commotion about that.

And who knows how authentic the recipes Paul and Prue chose and discussed were? If the Mexican food ep is any gauge...yikes.

Isn’t the show about fusion anyway? Most people bring the flavors of their own home country (India, Asia etc) to all these dishes, including country specific episodes like Japan and Mexico week.

Not really. The fusion tends to be incidental. Quit making excuses for this over the hill show.

R206 Yet they're all also supposed to automatically know what a Jaffa cake is, what a bakewell is, what Victoria sponge is, what Chelsea buns and Cornish pasties are no matter where the people come from.

And the joke about Syllabub this episode. Is that a well known thing? I’ve never heard of that.

R209 Hello, Mr. Zebra, ran into some confusion with a Mrs. Crocodile.

Furry mussels marching on, she thinks she's Kaiser Wilhelm or a civilized syllabub to blow your mind!

[quote][R206] Yet they're all also supposed to automatically know what a Jaffa cake is, what a bakewell is, what Victoria sponge is, what Chelsea buns and Cornish pasties are no matter where the people come from.

Well, it is called Great BRITISH Bake-off. And, r207…no shit about it being incidental. It was about fusing flavors which is probably why you had pistachio and mango heavy seasons…it depended on the origins of the bakers.

R211 Of course. My only point is that they expect everyone to know every detail of British baking and to produce it authentically, but then they introduce other cultures' foods and do whatever the hell the want, making things up and getting the details wrong without a care.

It's almost satire-level commentary on Great Britain's colonialist culture.

I like the show a lot. I'm not condemning it but at the same time I certainly see some irony there.

Janusz seems like a sweetie, but his incessant giggling is a bit much.

Janusz is this come to life.

R214 You're thinking of German Jürgen. Janusz is Polish.

Potato, potahto. Jürgen wasn’t that fat or that gay.

R208 Even if you'd only lived in the UK for 6 months you'd know what all of those things are.

They are totally basic British foods.

For you, R187. Knock yourself out.

(Trigger warning: the shirt stays on.)

R44 Why would you expect South American countries to have good Mexican food? They aren't Mexicans. This is a bizarre expectation.

R47 It's not because of cultural/national tensions. It's because Mexico is a far away place to most South Americans.

R219: It's because of totally different social roots---African and Portuguese, and later also German and Italian. Other South American countries have different mixes than Mexico--Chile attracted Italian, Irish and Eastern European people (Patagonia) and there are large Chinese diasporas in Chile and Peru.

R220 Yes, I know. The whole world immigrated to Latin American. My point is that it's bizarre, for several reasons, to expect South Americans to have good Mexican food, and one of the main reasons is because it's far away. Chile, a country you mentioned, is far away from Mexico. Why would you go to Chile expecting good Mexican food? It's a strange expectation to have. It's almost like all these countries aren't the same! Imagine that.

R219, people have trouble distinguishing one Spanish-speaking culture from another.

People are always surprised that here in Miami it is hard to find Mexican food. They get shocked when I say, its because we don't have Mexicans. We have great Cuban, Columbian, Peruvian, and Argentinian food. If you want Mexican, we have Taco Bell.

There are Mexicans in Miami.

R223, very few though. And the largest concentration are way down south at the tip where few north Miami-Dade folk go.

Lots more Peruvians, Columbians, and Cubans with restaurants.

[quote] We have great Cuban, Columbian, Peruvian, and Argentinian food.

What makes food "Columbian?" Do they serve it in the university dining halls?

[quote] We have great Cuban, Columbian, Peruvian, and Argentinian food.

Ya seen one taco ya seen them all

The GBBO producers know nothing about food from any country outside Europe and the US. They are woefully ignorant, Accept that, ridicule them, and enjoy the show.

Well, they even get the US food wrong a lot. I remember Paul saying he hated American pies because they are too sweet. I’m like, well, the bad ones are. Nothing like writing off an entire country based on a bad experience.

I once spent a couple of weeks in Miami, staying at a very expensive hotel. I had been travelling for a month and had a lot of clothes to wash and didn't want to pay that overpriced hotel to have them cleaned. So I asked the concierge if she could give me the name of a laundry where I could get my stuff cleaned without breaking the bank. She gave me an address she said was in Little Havana and told me they only spoke Spanish.

So I went there. I don't speak Spanish. I do speak Italian and sometimes Italians and Spanish can vaguely understand each other. So I go in, speaking in Italian. The woman looks at me: "can't you speak English?"

It's the whitest, most western/anglospherean shit EVER to expect people from one country/culture to be as familiar with the culture, cuisine etc. of another country/culture as they are with their own and to start eagerly calling it racism when, shocker, they're not. There is no country on earth that could do this, America very much included.

Someone way upthread said the Mexicans they know just think it's funny/amusing when people mispronounce a word or get something wrong. In my experience that has been generally true of people from every culture I've ever interacted with. No one but white westerners (and let's be honest, it's usually Americans with Brits, Canadians and Aussies bringing up the rear) gets worked up about this at all. The fucking irony of people clutching their pearls over British people not being as familiar with Mexican cuisine as they are with British. I'd like to see the Mexican GBBO do British week. They'd get shit wrong, too. And anyone with half a brain and half a heart would just find it endearing and funny - which is the correct reaction.

You know there's real racism in America, right? Actual real poisonous racists out there, trying to harm decent society. I wonder how much good you could do if you put your energy into fighting them?

Britain is one of the most racist countries in the world, so let's not overlook that.

No it isn't, R231. It's one of the least racist countries on earth. Have you ever lived in or traveled anywhere outside the west? I wonder what the statistics say about interracial marriages? Do you think your average Brit would react the same way to their white daughter marrying a black man as the average Chinese citizen? You're insane if you do.

R230, um...its their job.

It is not like anyone is complaining about random people lacking knowledge. It is about people who put together a program featuring Mexican food and know nothing about it. They cannot be bothered to even google the proper pronunciation of the words they are using.

And how much are they getting paid?

R233 This is a woke show as they go out of their way to cast as many asian/muslim/black/pink haired/disabled bakers they can find. So yes their “jokes” and lack of knowledge about Mexico were in poor taste.

R232, are you a dark skinned person in Britain?

The stories relatives working there tell are far worse than anything I have encountered in the US.

[quote]Nothing like writing off an entire country based on a bad experience.

Here on DL people routinely write off entire countries based on a story they once heard.

R224 Here in D.C., we have a lot of Salvadorian and some Puerto Rican restaurants, and I've heard various Latino/a/x people complain.

I've worked with several people of Domenican heritage who complain they've been told about great Domenican restaurants and then they go and recognize immediately that the food is Puerto Rican and sold as Domenican because there's a growing Domenican population.

I've worked with lots of Cuban people from Miami who complain about all the Mexican restaurants here and the dearth of 'real' Cuban food.

I've worked with a couple of Mexican people who say it's impossible to find real Mexican food.

And I've worked with Panamanian people who've said they are white and not into Hispanic food.

I grew up with close friends who parents were from Peru, and I worked with someone from Chile, but most Spanish-speaking people in this area come from Central America or the DR or PR (always by way of NYC) or Cuba (always by way of Miami).

For a couple decades, DC had almost no Mexicans and the because Salvadoran and Guatemalan food was unknown, the Salvadorans and Guatemalans had Mexican restaurants which had obviously un-authentic food (boiling stuff that Mexicans fry, etc.). Even where you have Spanish meets Indian cultures, the results aren't the same. That's why culture matters.

It's funny that people seem to think Mexico is a tiny little country that just hangs out underneath the vast state of Texas, and that, somehow, all of South America is 'just Mexico.'

Meanwhile, on planet Earth, Mexico is the size of 24 European countries and it is part of the Central Americam tip of the vast continental iceberg that is South America.

So now, we have a "Mexico is the center of the universe" troll.

[quote] Mexico is the size of 24 European countries and it is part of the Central Americam tip of the vast continental iceberg that is South America.

Good illustration why the entire population of such a large segment of the Earth shouldn't be allowed to ignore laws and borders to just walk into another country and be rewarded with free money, housing, and medical services that are not even so readily available to law abiding native citizens.

When did Stephen Miller discover DataLounge and how can we get rid of him?

Punch and delete.

The recent meme that claims Britain is one of the least racist countries on earth is based on absolutely nothing but an online article from 20 years ago. A more recent article linking to a lot of smaller studies shows that Britain is still very much racist, despite the people who parrot the "least racist" trope.

I know people who had strangers repeatedly come up to them during Brexit, to tell them they would have to leave England when Brexit happened.

Teachers who had white students say they did not have to listen to them because they were black.

It is pretty fucking racist, in spite of what you see in BBC dramas.

Back in 2000 when I went to Canbridge, I met a local guy on gay.com and we had an...interesting conversation. He told me off the bat, 'We're not racist like you are.' I said, 'I'm racist? Why am I racist?' And he was like, 'Everyone knows Americans are racist. It's a racist Puritan country.' And I told him I am not religious at all and find it interesting that Brits keep telling me I am, while they have multiple churches on every block I had walked past. He told me, 'You're racist, the whole country is racist, to you it's black or white, here, black or white or any other color, we're all British. Except the Pakis. We hate them.'

Every country has its fair share of ignorant racist bigots, including those Scandinavian countries with their liberal-minded reputation.

The real issue is that pointing fingers at other countries doesn't make your own country any better when it comes to the racism problem. Take responsibility for your country's issues and problems, and either be part of the solution or (remain) part of the problem. And no, pointing fingers at other countries isn't being part of the solution.

There's no uniformity of thought among any non-cultish group. Lots of American people are not rabidly racist but some are. Lots of Europeans are not but some are. Plenty of others embrace open-minded idologies but then have become more conservative as they welcomed immigrants from more conservative places and religions into their countries and witnessed those people get involved as citizens in politics and changing the country's values from progressive to conservative. Different forces make different people bigoted.

In the US, slavery explicitly told white Americans they are superior beings. But also, every new wave of immigrants from every new country was egregiously discriminated against, from Chinese people on the West Coast to Irish refugees in New England and New York to Vietnamese immigrants in the 70s.

In Prussia, pre-Germany, borders and country names changed all the time. Then there was Germany, then came German nationalist supremacy bigots, then came genocide, then came collapse, then came the most open country in Europe to refugees, and now comes the backlash, with nationalistic Germans who embrace liberal ideas being converted into conservative nationalistic Germans who feel threatened by Muslim immigrants, both values-wise and economically.

There's no stability. And as long as there are discrete nations (and states) with different cultures and people are mobile and cross borders regularly, there will be dangerous nationalism, xenophobia, racism and other bigotry. People react to feeling threatened by hating.

[quote]If you want Mexican, we have Taco Bell.

Let's be very clear here... Taco Bell is NOT "Mexican Food". When Taco Bell opened up a restaurant in Mexico City, they had to advertise it as "American Food". Mexicans don't recognize it as "Mexican" at all. It's not even Tex-Mex really. It's its own thing, a sort of naive/ignorant American impression of what "Mexican Food" is I guess, but really, Tex-Mex.

It's hilarious how Taco Bell just re-uses Mexican food names arbitrarily too. Like, what they call a "chalupa" isn't anything like a Mexican chalupa (which is more like what we call a Tostada). What they call a Gordita isn't anything like what a Mexican gordita is... in fact the Taco Bell "Chalupa" is a lot closer to a Mexican "gordita" than anything else, and the Taco Bell "Gordita" is ... I dunno, a flatbread taco? It doesn't even exist in Mexican cuisine really. And of course there's the old story of the now-defunct Taco Bell "Chilito", which they had to remove once they found out it was Mexicans lang for "tiny penis". Nobody at Taco Bell speaks Spanish, apparently, that that stayed on the menu for YEARS.

R249 That rant is unnecessary. No one on Earth believes Taco Bell sells authentic Mexican food, just like no one on Earth thinks astronaut ice cream is ice cream.

R250, let me quote the quote to you again since you clearly missed it:

[quote]If you want Mexican, we have Taco Bell.

Also, R249 was not a "Rant", it was a simple discussion of facts. Pull that stick out of your ass, dear.

Ummm....R249, you seem to have missed the joke.

When I said, "If you want Mexican, we have Taco Bell," the whole joke was that Taco Bell is not actually Mexican.

I think most people understood it was a joke, not an earnest recommendation of Taco Bell for Mexican cuisine.

(I almost said Chipotle, but thought some dim bulbs would take me seriously. So I made it Taco Bell, since I figured no one would take that seriously.)

R252 obviously doesn't live where people think Taco Bell is actual Mexican Food...

R252 I think we may be dealing with someone on the spectrum who isn't wired for humor or subtext.

R245 Brexit wasn't racist. That's an American idea. The black people in the UK came from the Commonwealth not from the EU. Brexit was anti-EU. After the EU let the Eastern European countries join, the UK was flooded with Poles, migrants from the ex-Yugo. All white as the driven snow and all annoying as hell. They arrived in the UK and rapidly depleted social services. If Brexit was anything, it was anti-white people from Eastern Europe.

R255, I do not know what Brexit was. But I just know that British people used it as an opening to tell black people (who were born in England!) that they were not welcome.

The point R255 is not about Brexit, but rather this absurd idea that Britain is not racist.

R256 you are so full of shit. Typical ignorant American.

R255 But uhm the Commonwealth is largely made up of nations whose indigenous peoples were subjugated and forced to work to enrich the British monarch.

Most American people have come to accept and are able to acknowledge our racist past history and ongoing racist history as it develops.

From this vantage point, it's hard to smile politely while British people continually point the finger at the US's racism. We KNOW we have been and continue to be racist. Many of us are doing our best to change. Many British people seem to be in absolute denial of the racism inherent in their colonization of countries with nonwhite people, their role in designing the American slavery model and implementing it before there ever was a United States of America. It seems crazy that British people keep calling everyone else racist and saying they are not.

[quote] we're all British. Except the Pakis. We hate them.'

It was the Pakis to whom Enoch Powell referred in his ingratiation speech.

Powell said, “I am filled with foreboding; like the Roman, I seem to see ‘the River Tiber foaming with much blood,’” an allusion to a line in Virgil’s Aeneid. He maintained that it would not be enough to close Britain’s borders—some of the immigrants already settled in the country would need to be sent “home.” If not, he declared, attributing a quote to one of his constituents, “in this country, in 15 or 20 years’ time, the black man will have the whip hand over the white man.”

Outraged Americans didn't realize the different American and British view of who is "black".

R259 most Americans have come to accept and acknowledge our racist past, huh? I guess you missed all the Confederate flags on January 6th.

When it comes to vile racism, it's USA! USA! USA! And always will be.

R260 you do realize using "Pakis" is racist? And are you aware Enoch Powell is one of the most despised public figures in the UK? He's right up there with Oswald Mosley. The George Wallace of Britain.

Whenever anyone from Europe brags about how unracist they are, just whisper, "Gypsies" and watch them start screaming like Hitler.

[quote][R255], I do not know what Brexit was. But I just know that British people used it as an opening to tell black people (who were born in England!) that they were not welcome.

You’re right. You don’t know what Brexit was…and you still don’t.

27% of Black British people voted for Brexit, amongst other ethnic groups it was higher.

This is very clever. Diverting us from the main issue of British racism by turning the conversation to Brexit.

As if all the racists disappeared after the vote.

The Racism is rarely aimed at Black people, they are now 2nd/3rd generation and have integrated into British society, a lot are also mixed race now. A lot of us have black friends.

The Pakistani community suffers much more from it as they are still 1st/2nd generation and insistent on living in fairly closed communities, hopefully they will eventually embrace the culture of the Country they now reside in. Indians already have.

Again, R267, black people would beg to differ.

R268 Do you live in the UK?

Digging into Taco Bell online, I found this:

On July 21, 2009, Gidget, the Chihuahua featured in Taco Bell ads in the late 1990s, was euthanized after suffering a stroke. She was 15 years old.

R269, relatives live there.

R267 Muslims embrace the west countries where they immigrated to? LOL

[quote]This is very clever. Diverting us from the main issue of British racism by turning the conversation to Brexit.

This is very clever. Diverting us from the main issue of the Great British Bake-Off by turning the conversation to British racism.

Let us know when a black Brit gets murdered by the cops for driving while black.

This thread has gone completely off the rails more than any other I have ever seen.

R271 They must live in some very strange places?

I've watched most of the seasons several times. I know I'll do it again. It's comforting.

Steven reminds me of my best friend in college. That's nice, too.

I'm still carrying a torch for Tamal, my future husband.

R278 He’s fat now.

r279 More to love.

I still want James Morton, he’s gotten better with age and isn’t a pathetic roided whore like someone.

I loved Peter Sawkins and Andrew Smyth. I though they were sweet, gentle souls. Andrew is out, but I'm not sure about Peter's orientation..... and both of them could really bake.

Peter is a closet case sadly.

[quote]I'm still carrying a torch for Tamal

Same here. I fucked Marcela Valladolid, so I know all about Tamal. Tamal are the traditional breakfast during Mexico's Dragon Boat Festival. They're made by stuffing chopped tackos, Gentleman's Relish, chinchilly cream, and a tiny plastic pig into raw tacko before it's wrapped in corn husks and roasted directly over a roaring grease fire.

The challenge for the bakers is getting a good melt on the pigs' ears and tails without the husks showing any hint of charring. Prue, I know you've handled a tail or two in your time...

Prue: Oh, Mexico on a plate!

I think R284 isn’t thinking about the same Tamal we are…

But it’s nice to see we’ve brought the thread back on track.

You'll have to prove to me that your Tamal isn't stuffed with all of those things.

As you know, I take a keen interest in the tragically unfit bodies of my peers, and also those of much older women like Dawn.

Tamal is stuffed by white meat.

R283 Peter is out of the closet. He went on vacation with his partner.

R288 What? Where? Is his boyfriend Chigs? I wanna see Chigs fuck his pink hole tbh.

If Chigs is in the conversation, I'll take care of Chigs myself.

R288 That's false. Peter posted a photo of himself holding a man's hand in June and LOTS of press said he had 'come out' without asking him. He immediately posted that he respects LGBT people and so he is conflicted about posting an announcement, but the photo was misinterpreted and he does not consider himself to be part of the LGBT community. Lots of press did not pick that part up, but a couple of outlets did.

I don't think he's gay, anyway. I think he's a nerdy British kid who happens to look like a pretty lesbian who tries to look a rich Ivy Leaguer.

Chigs has the most amazing teeth. The UK government should sequence his DNA and use CRISPR technology to replace British embryos' teeth genes with his.