Nick Griffin stars in first cookery role as BNP TV chef offering ‘traditional British fare’
In bizarre twist for recently-bankrupt politician, Mr Griffin provides what he calls his ‘Recipe for beating the Tory blues’
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The BNP leader Nick Griffin appears to have made a first attempt at launching himself into a career as a TV chef, with what threatens to be the first of many cookery programmes on BNP TV.
Dressed in a Help for Heroes rugby shirt and standing in his home kitchen, Mr Griffin talks the viewer through his recipe for a beef stew, in a video posted to YouTube entitled “Recipe for beating the Tory blues”.
The fledgling presenter, who last week filed for bankruptcy, explains that he wants to provide simple, cheap recipe ideas to BNP members who have told him “their wives can’t afford to put enough decent food on the table”. He nonetheless adds the caveat that “we’ve not done this before”.
Apologising to those who already know how to do a bit of cooking, Mr Griffin gets down to the basics with advice such as “different things make different times to cook”, “do take the tin foil off your stock cubes” and – when peeling an onion – “get rid of the outside stuff you obviously don’t want to eat”.
Early on Mr Griffin admits that normally “BNP TV does politics not cookery”, and while working with his “British stewing steak” and “British white potatoes” the politician cannot help but throw in a couple of asides on matters of personal interest.
“English cookery actually for centuries was the best in Europe,” he says at one point. “It only became very simple after the Hanoverians came over from Germany.
“Incidentally, the word ‘curry’ first appears from a cookery book during the reign of, I think it’s Richard II, 13th century,” he adds. “So don’t let people tell you that you have to have huge numbers of immigrants to have good cooking.”
He goes on: “We’ve got a Mexican restaurant in a town not far from here. The place isn’t swamped with Mexicans. You take the recipe – that’s really all you need.”
In scenes very loosely reminiscent of the end of a Nigella Lawson cookery programme, Mr Griffin ends the programme by serving up the dish to what appear to be friends, family and fellow BNP members. He ends by asking for “serious constructive criticisms” of his “good, standard, traditional British fare”.
Watch the full video below:
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments