The Christchurch café owner who courted controversy with his pie which 'sounds slightly gay' has changed his menu, to an even weirder one. New menu, more bad jokes? Back in January, GayNZ.com readers told us of central Christchurch's Crumpet Club menu, which included the listing "Chicken, brie and sweet corn with a green salad. Sounds slightly gay, I know, but oh so tasty." One gay patron had threatened to complain to the Human Rights Commission about the "anti-gay slur" - an implication that being 'slightly gay' is undesirable. Broken by GayNZ.com, the story made it into Express newspaper and even the New Zealand Herald. The café's manager Phillip Krall had promised to change the menu. "I take these complaints seriously and we're in the process of updating," he explained. The Crumpet Club's new menu, launched this week, now contains this listing: "Chicken, field mushroom, cheese and tarragon pie with a crisp green salad. A derivative of the now legendary pie made infamous by GayNZ.com, Express Today and The New Zealand Herald, who all wrote "it's oh so tasty!"" The new menu also endorses a Thai pork and pumpkin curry pastie with this quote: "Oh yah, you love dis one long time!", which customers are invited to "read with Thai accent". The 'joke'-laden menu concludes: "We at the Crumpet Club welcome all races, creeds, sexual orientations, religions and political persuasions (although the Labour government did test us) We do not welcome people with no sense of humour!" One of the café-goers who complained to us about the original menu now reflects: "I hate to say it, but I think we have added to their publicity. "The tone of it is just fingers up at us," he adds. "Anyway, once a dork, always a dork."
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News Staff
First published: Thursday, 5th March 2009 - 1:01pm