When did the world become so pedantic? So obsessive? So horribly, stupidly, ridiculously petty? And nothing provokes emotions more than food. So some idiotic blogger (they’re all fuckin’ eejuts, the lotto’v ‘em) or podcaster decided that ‘enough is enough!!!’, we’re no longer going to be allowed to use the word… ‘curry’.

But… but… but… curry’s food! Curry’s wonderful!!! Curry’s the best thing since sliced chapatti!!! Yes, but the word is… CULTURAL APPROPRIATION!!! What? How? When?

According to some babe in California, there is no such thing as curry. It’s a western, white construct designed to reduce the entire culinary output of a massive and diverse nation into a simple bowl of slop with chilli in it. Just for the record, I love that bowl of slop with a passion. But curry? That word??? Yet hang on, the word was introduced in the 1950s and 60s by South Asian immigrants who opened restaurants here. They GAVE us that word. It was a gift. In fact it was a total blessing, but the wokish assholes of today use no word with as much accusatory venom as ‘colonialism!!!!’ And according to this bimbo, ‘curry’ reeks of its colonial past. As well as garlic, herbs, capsicum, pepper and onions.

Jamie Oliver was accused of ‘cultural appropriatin’ when he made ‘jerk rice’. HOW DARE YOU!!! A WHITE MAN, NOT FROM JAMAICA!!!! Marks and Spencer were attacked for their ‘vegetable biryani wrap’. They were told ‘in India there is no such thing as vegetable biryani’. Yeah, but in Croydon there is, so just piss off.

It is not ‘cultural appropriation’ to take food ideas from different countries and mix them, include them, change them, to create new ideas, new tastes. It’s called ‘cookin’. It is the finest compliment you can pay.

My own food-history-line started in Poland. It was all about what you could eat quickly before the Cossacks came and beat you with sticks. And my grandmother, bless her soul, loved something she called (in Yiddish) ‘feece’. Otherwise known as ‘calves foot jelly’. It was revolting to look at, I never ever tasted it, but she adored it. Peasant food from Poland. But was making it in England ‘cultural appropriation’? No-one ever complained. Only the calf. About where his foot had gone.

So to the Californian-Indian accuser who wants us to ‘unlearn’ the word ‘curry’, I only have one word to say… possibly two words… one word split in two…

Tex-Mex!!! Eat that you pedantic bitch.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx