Image Text:

INSULTING: Marco Pierre White’s video has sparked outrage amongst the Jamaican community

A VIDEO of Marco Pierre White cooking what he describes as a “Jamaican style” dish has been removed from Knorr’s YouTube channel.

The video, which sees the British chef cooking chicken drumsticks with brown rice and peas, using his brand of Knorr chicken stock pots, has been deleted from the food brand’s website, following outrage from the Jamaican community, who have slammed the chef for claiming his dish is a Jamaican-inspired recipe.

White begins his cookery demonstration, describing his dish as “Brown rice, Jamaican style,” before stating: “I go to Jamaica now and then and it’s something the locals cook for me, which is delicious. Rice with chicken drumsticks and peas. Very easy.”

The celebrity chef then fries chopped onions in a large pan, before adding three cups of rice, half a litre of water and three chicken stock pots. After the rice has cooked for approximately 30 minutes, White controversially adds garden peas – as opposed to red kidney beans or gungo peas, traditionally used in Jamaican rice and peas – to the pot.

After stirring in the peas, the chef transfers the concoction to a baking dish and garnishes the meal with parsley, before declaring: “So there we have our brown rice, Jamaican style, with the chicken drumsticks and the peas.”

The video sparked outrage from many in the Jamaican community, who have lambasted White for claiming his dish is an authentic Jamaican recipe.

DIFFERENT: White uses garden peas in his rice and peas dish

One comment on YouTube reads: “This is a joke right? He doesn't wash his rice, or season his chicken, or use PROPER PEAS. This is not Jamaican.”

Another viewer posted: “Marco – a word in your ear my brother! You should have consulted with an actual Jamaican before undertaking such cooking finery. The list of wrongs illustrated in this video is endless. What you have presented here quite frankly is insulting to anyone who regularly puts 100% of love into preparing and cooking this dish. If you indeed had any Jamaicans as friends/associates before this video, I suggest you make haste and issue apologies to them asap.”

A petition has even been launched via online activist network Avaaz, calling on the chef to “issue a public apology to the people of Jamaica”.

Knorr has since removed the video from its YouTube channel, and issued the following post on White’s YouTube channel, where the video can still be viewed:

“In response to user feedback, we have removed this video from our official Knorr YouTube channel. However, this channel (Marco Pierre White - Recipes) does not belong to Knorr, and as such we have no control over the content.

BON APPÉTIT: The chef’s finished dish, garnished with parsley

“Therefore we cannot remove this video ourselves, though we are currently taking steps to ensure that this video is removed by the channel owner ASAP. We always welcome feedback from community members and we’d like to thank you for bringing this to our attention.”

Watch Marco Pierre White’s chicken drumsticks with brown rice and peas dish video here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XZ5z7o2NwU