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Marks and spencer accused of cultural appropriation

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Original post by It's****ingWOODY
It wouldn't be ravioli if it had those ingredients in, would it?

Ravioli can be filled with almost anything.

https://www.wideopeneats.com/13-ravioli-fillings-thatll-inspire-you-to-make-your-own/
If someone prints a French flag and sells it as a German flag, they are incorrect and that's what needs to be rectified. Selling a French or German flag is fine.

That's the same as this. Erroneously labelling some spicy stuff in a wrap as a biryani means they need to change the label, not be chastised for selling spicy stuff in a wrap or an actual biryani with which there's nothing wrong.
Original post by Notoriety
I.e. English spoken by educated fluent English speakers. I only checked the OED because I consider myself quite smart and I enjoy words.


This is all much more subtle than recycling facts to assert one's own intellect, isn't it :biggrin:

Original post by Notoriety
I never really considered biryani to mean "only with meat". I was wondering why you and others in this thread might think it does; maybe my education failed me. OED shows that it doesn't have this meaning in the Standard English context, so maybe you just took the words of the Metro at face value and you also had no clue what the word means. Or you trained under a Michelin-starred Indian chef with some very strong opinions, I dunno.


The other possibility is that I'm rather passionate about good food and also happened to grow up with Indians as family friends. There's absolutely no need to go b******ising the ingredients when there are so many types of curry, many of which would suit someone who didn't want meat.
Hmm, misleading label but I still don't care.
Original post by Mess.
Anyone self described as a ‘foodie’ has 100% chance of being an absolute bell.

:laugh:

Bad, bad *******s.
Original post by Decahedron
Inuits live around the North Pole, Penguins are around the South Pole, the two never meet :facepalm:


you are so Pole-ist

smh
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
You're missing the point. A biryani is a biryani. It's like selling a bolognese wrap with chicken - it's not a bolognese. What they're selling is a vegetable curry wrap, it's not a biryani. I can't even see how this is a debate, it's mislabelling, pure and simple.

This does sound like an issue for trading standards. It does however have the merit of facilitating great PR opportunities for assorted Indian restaurants and chefs in obtaining media coverage for their businesses. :teehee:
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
the "it's just a name on a food label mate, chill" camp.


No, you're not understanding. Most of us aren't saying 'yeah, it's bad, but it's just a food label, so don't worry about it'. Most of us are saying, 'it's perfectly fine and your objection makes no sense'.

Original post by It's****ingWOODY
The other possibility is that I'm rather passionate about good food and also happened to grow up with Indians as family friends. There's absolutely no need to go b******ising the ingredients when there are so many types of curry, many of which would suit someone who didn't want meat.


You might be passionate about good food, but picking a highly prescriptive definition of a fluidly understood foreign term and then complaining bitterly that not everyone is adhering to it doesn't prove that.

Not understanding how language is used and develops doesn't make you a 'foodie'.

If anything, the suggestion that we've already got enough different kinds of food and we don't need any more makes you not a foodie. Foodies tend to appreciate new ideas and developments in food. They don't tend to insist that we stick to the closed list of dishes we have, and keep them all carefully contained in their own little pigeonholes.
(edited 5 years ago)
Original post by TimmonaPortella
No, you're not understanding. Most of us aren't saying 'yeah, it's bad, but it's just a food label, so don't worry about it'. Most of us are saying, 'it's perfectly fine and your objection makes no sense'.



You might be passionate about good food, but picking a highly prescriptive definition of a fluidly understood foreign term and then complaining bitterly that not everyone is adhering to it doesn't prove that.

Not understanding how language is used and develops doesn't make you a 'foodie'.

If anything, the suggestion that we've already got enough different kinds of food and we don't need any more makes you not a foodie. Foodies tend to appreciate new ideas and developments in food. They don't tend to insist that we stick to the closed list of dishes we have, and keep them all carefully contained in their own little pigeonholes.


You fail to understand that, as someone has already pointed out, this is not a new idea by M&S - it's already a dish. I'm all for the invention of new dishes, but this isn't that, it's just pure mislabelling. Don't call it a biryani when it's not a biryani (and I don't believe calling it a "biriyani" was intentionally done and was likely just a misspelling).
(edited 5 years ago)
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
Don't call it a biryani when it's not a biryani (and I don't believe calling it a "biriyani" was intentionally done and was likely just a misspelling).

Or perhaps the M & S intern responsible for product naming simply checked the BBC food pages.
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2063651/biriyani
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
I don't believe calling it a "biriyani" was intentionally done and was likely just a misspelling).

No. This word is a transliteration from an Asian language. You will find biryani, birani, biriyani and even briyani in use (and maybe more variations).
Original post by Fullofsurprises
Or perhaps the M & S intern responsible for product naming simply checked the BBC food pages.
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2063651/biriyani


Good shout I think :biggrin:

Original post by Good bloke
No. This word is a transliteration from an Asian language. You will find biryani, birani, biriyani and even briyani in use (and maybe more variations).


Granted and maybe misspelling was the wrong word to use, but one or two people have claimed that a "biriyani" is somehow supposed to be different to a biryani and this was the purpose behind the spelling as it signifies M&S putting their own twist on it, which is nonsense.
I swear people are so bored nowadays that they want to complain and make drama on petty little things such as this. It's only food and food is universal and what connects people together, it's where chefs are inspired by several cultures and infuse it into a dish. This isn't cultural appropriation. This is a vegan wrap inspired by an Indian dish. Leave M&S alone!
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
one or two people have claimed that a "biriyani" is somehow supposed to be different to a biryani

I agree. However, there are many, many variations of biryani including, contrary to what some here have claimed, vegetable ones (especially from Calcutta). Obviously, none are wraps but one can hardly fault a company for making the flavours of something interesting and exotic available to people wanting a quick lunch while out and about. The whole point of a sandwich is to put food of all kinds into a readily-handled form.

This is not just just a biryani. This is an adventurous, portable, delicious, vegetarian, M & S fusion biryani.
(edited 5 years ago)
Original post by RoseRouge
Leave M&S alone!


Original post by It's****ingWOODY
This is all much more subtle than recycling facts to assert one's own intellect, isn't it :biggrin:



The other possibility is that I'm rather passionate about good food and also happened to grow up with Indians as family friends. There's absolutely no need to go b******ising the ingredients when there are so many types of curry, many of which would suit someone who didn't want meat.

One's own intellect. Oh looka here, we got him bringing out the bachelor's at last.

See, I knew it. You were professing to have some special knowledge, here as a lover of good food (I didn't read your foodie stuff above). So I was spot on. Pedantry is all about status, unless you're on the spectrum. Your pedantry might be better placed if you lived on the sub-cont, but speakers of English are well-justified in their usage as described by the Oxon dict.
Original post by Notoriety
One's own intellect. Oh looka here, we got him bringing out the bachelor's at last.

See, I knew it. You were professing to have some special knowledge, here as a lover of good food (I didn't read your foodie stuff above). So I was spot on. Pedantry is all about status, unless you're on the spectrum. Your pedantry might be better placed if you lived on the sub-cont, but speakers of English are well-justified in their usage as described by the Oxon dict.


Ermm.... eh? You don't remember using the QI example and me earlier saying that it's no correlation to someone being apparently pedantic about food? This isn't about me...

Call it what you like, all I see it as is pointing out that it's not a biryani and happen to know it's not a biryani because I know what a biryani is. Not exactly specialist knowledge.
Right now I'm wondering if Birriyani is permissable, or how about the new M & S chicken & chips 'n bar-b-cue Texan Biryani. I really didn't make that up, apart from the fact that I did.

Do I get the job as Nu Foods Inventory Manager (assistant to)?
Original post by Fullofsurprises
Right now I'm wondering if Birriyani is permissable, or how about the new M & S chicken & chips 'n bar-b-cue Texan Biryani. I really didn't make that up, apart from the fact that I did.

Do I get the job as Nu Foods Inventory Manager (assistant to)?

Sounds lush.
Original post by It's****ingWOODY
Ermm.... eh? You don't remember using the QI example and me earlier saying that it's no correlation to someone being apparently pedantic about food? This isn't about me...

Call it what you like, all I see it as is pointing out that it's not a biryani and happen to know it's not a biryani because I know what a biryani is. Not exactly specialist knowledge.

It is specialist. We have established there is a common meaning that M&S complies with, and you rejected this by saying there is an elite band of leading Indian chefs who reject this meaning -- and that you are intimately familiar with this in-group's sensibilities and share their rejection.

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