Racist ice cream? French cafe pulls ‘Chinese’ and ‘African’ desserts after outcry
Story highlights
While the African ice cream dessert was topped by a chocolate-covered meringue ball decorated with thick red lips, the Chinese lemon sorbet had a yellow meringue head, with thinly drawn eyes.
A cafe on France's Cote d'Azur is now pulling its ‘Chinese’ and ‘African’ desserts from its menu, responding to accusations of racism.
While the African ice cream dessert was topped by a chocolate-covered meringue ball decorated with thick red lips, the Chinese lemon sorbet had a yellow meringue head, with thinly drawn eyes.
A July 20 tweet calling for a boycott of Le Poussin Bleu (The Blue Chick) in Saint-Rapha for its racist ice creams had by Tuesday got tens of thousands of likes and retweets.
Restaurant le Poussin Bleu à St Raphaël et leur sélection de glaces, c’est particulièrement raciste... non ? pic.twitter.com/rdwp6rO4Wi
— Stioucha (@stioucha) August 2, 2019
In a response on Facebook titled ''the African and the Chinese struck down by social networks,'' the cafe owners said they were expunging the ice creams from their menu ''after this storm of violence and insults.''
The ice creams were already on the menu when the current owners in 1986 took over the cafe opened in 1947.
''We are not 'racist.'' We respect everyone!'' they wrote in their Facebook post.
Naively, we kept these ice creams as they were, without any bad thoughts. They surely date from the colonial era but past history has made the France of today."
''These ice creams have given pleasure to many generations of families of different origins. If they have bothered a few people recently we are sorry.'' the owners added.