Padma Lakshmi Calls Out WaPo Columnist Who Described Indian Food As “Based Entirely On One Spice”
Is this really the type of colonizer 'hot take' the @washingtonpost wants to publish in 2021- sardonically characterizing curry as "one spice" and that all of India's cuisine is based on it? pic.twitter.com/suneMRD8vs
- Padma Lakshmi (@PadmaLakshmi) August 23, 2021
Top Chef host, model and author Padma Lakshmi responded on Twitter to an opinion piece that described Indian food as “based entirely on one spice” and tasting “like something that could knock a vulture off a meat wagon” in an article.
The article, “You can’t make me eat these foods,” was written by Washington Post “humor” columnist Gene Weingarten, and focused on several foods he says he refuses to eat and why. Some of the other foods mentioned: Old Bay seasoning, balsamic vinegar, anchovies, hazelnut, pizza or hot dogs with more than two toppings?, cooked green peppers, “garbage sushi,” sweet pickles and bleu cheese.
When the columnist double downed on the social media backlash, Lakshmi responded, “on behalf of 1.3 billion people, kindly fuck off.”
[Full Quote of What He Wrote]The Indian subcontinent has vastly enriched the world, giving us chess, buttons, the mathematical concept of zero, shampoo, modern-day nonviolent political resistance, Chutes and Ladders, the Fibonacci sequence, rock candy, cataract surgery, cashmere, USB ports ... and the only ethnic cuisine in the world insanely based entirely on one spice. If you like Indian curries, yay, you like Indian food! If you think Indian curries taste like something that could knock a vulture off a meat wagon, you do not like Indian food. I don’t get it, as a culinary principle. It is as though the French passed a law requiring every dish to be slathered in smashed, pureed snails. (I’d personally have no problem with that, but you might, and I would sympathize.)
You *clearly* need an education on spices, flavor, and taste….
I suggest starting with my book “The Encyclopedia of Spices & Herbs”:https://t.co/DARIJ1olqf
- Padma Lakshmi (@PadmaLakshmi) August 23, 2021
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