Sombreros, serapes and maracas, horrible pronunciations, jokes about Mexicanstand-offs, and really strange-looking tacos — did the “Mexican Week” episodeof “The Great British Baking Show” leave any stereotypical stone unturned?After a similar debacle with Season 11’s “Japanese Week,” the internationallybeloved competition series — which streams on Netflix in the US — apparentlydecided not to learn from its mistakes, and dove headlong into Mexican food.And since the competition is largely to determine who can create the bestbaked goods, many observers wondered, why were they attempting tacos, anyway?
Just before the episode dropped on Oct. 7, the promos featuring sombrero-wearing hosts Noel Fielding and Matt Lucas came under fire from social mediacommenters — largely from the US, where finding a good taco is not asdifficult as in the UK — who were quick to weigh in on the show’s utterfailure to try to understand more than the most obvious characteristics ofMexican food and culture. Even the English-language plural of the word cactuseluded one of the contestants — not to mention the woman whose absolutelywretched try at guacamole sounded more like “glakeemolo.”
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Pronunciation snafus, aside, many viewers found the episode frankly offensiveand racist. “Nobody gave a fuck about Mexican culture, putting that showtogether. The poncho and the sombrero, talking about a Mexican standoff — itwas a racist show,” said Bill Esparza, author of the book “LA Mexicano.”
“The real problem here is the lack of respect for the people. They have nobusiness doing cultural weeks of any kind,” Esparza continued.
After the Japanese Week outcry, “the fact they would get some criticism and doit again — it seems like they’re ok about it,” Esparza said.
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“It’s not hard to learn to pronounce words correctly, even for a living muppetof a host,” wrote José Ralat, the Taco Editor of Texas Monthly magazine.
“Tacos, new one on me,” says one contestant, as they are given the assignmentfor the technical challenge of making tortillas from canned “yellow fieldcorn” and adding steak, spicy refried beans, guacamole and pico de gallo tomake some sort or gloppy pile of taco topped with rare meat. The differencebetween tacos and “torteellas” perplexes one chef while the other predictablyworries, “I just hope my chili is not too hot!”
“The food was beyond absurd, because the people who were directing them tomake it didn’t know what they were doing,” said Esparza, “The episode goesbeyond the awful food. It almost seems like it’s offensive on purpose.”
Austin, Texas-based journalist Kate Sánchez tried to put the furor intoperspective, noting “Don’t get me wrong it’s definitely racist but also DACAwas deemed illegal and my community is being actively harmed by forces not onmy TV so glocklymolo and ominous maraca shaking is at least the stuff I canlaugh at.” However, she did admit that peeling an avocado like a potatoconstituted “an act of physical violence against my people.”
“Absolutely haunted by this week’s #GBBO, I will never get the image of Carolepeeling an avocado like a potato out of my head,” agreed Twitter user@IWillLeaveNow.
“Bracing ourselves for a whole lot of cringe,” wrote German-based historianand teacher Daniel Salina Córdova, who also shared a bingo card featuring allthe stereotypically Mexican tropes used on the show.
“Mexican week on the #GBBO is so cringingly racially and culturallyinsensitive I have to ask how it was approved,” wrote @kcrusher on Twitter.
Did the show decide it might be better to apologize for stereotypes that havecreated harmful images of Mexican people for years? No, it didn’t, it made asilly taco joke. Netflix did not respond to a request for comment.
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