Glossary entry

English term or phrase:

as nice as it is naughty

English answer:

as tasty as it is enticingly self-indulgent

Added to glossary by Charles Davis
Mar 10, 2016 05:59
8 yrs ago
2 viewers *
English term

as nice as it is naughty

Non-PRO English Other Cooking / Culinary Food descriptor
Dear colleagues,

We're discussing this phrase in an English-Hungarian question. The discussion is very interesting, because there are many approaches proposed, not to mention the cultural differences that add even more flavor to it.

The context is a healthy muffin recipe: "a delicious, occasional treat that is as nice as it is naughty".

What does nice and naughty mean here?

Our ideas:
1) An experienced colleague explained that nice & naughty is generally used by Santa Claus, a lovely connotation. I too believe naughty food means food that's very tasty and attractive, but not necessarily healthy, something that makes you feel guilty. And this recipe is both nice (i.e. healthy) and naughty (i.e. pleases gourmet palates, as well).

2) Another colleague believes it means the muffin is very tasty, but doesn't look good, it's inaesthetic.

So what is it? Healthy & tasty or ugly & tasty?

Thank you very much for any input.
Change log

Mar 12, 2016 08:49: Charles Davis Created KOG entry

Mar 12, 2016 08:49: Charles Davis changed "Edited KOG entry" from "<a href="/profile/1321043">Charles Davis's</a> old entry - "as nice as it is naughty"" to ""as tasty as it is enticing self-indulgent""

Discussion

Katherine Rutter Mar 10, 2016:
agree with Noni Naughty but nice means that it is a tasty treat but not a particularly healthy one. It is "naughty" because it is not part of your healthy diet, but it is "nice", i.e tasty. Since it is supposed to be an occasional treat, it probably isn't that healthy. What they almost certainly mean is that their product is a nice way to indulge yourself with a treat.
Noni Gilbert Riley Mar 10, 2016:
Naughty but nice as a set expression. As some of you may have noticed, the over-40s [I'm being generous!] section of Proz translators who were brought up in the UK is getting all nostalgic over an advertising campaign, and I was led to reflect on whether the impact of the campaign was great enough to move the expression into common usage. Interesting too is the different interpretation to be found across the pond. If you want a bit of fun, google "naughty but nice" on google.co.uk and limit responses to UK, and the hits will differ greatly from those that google.com will come up with...
Annamaria Amik (asker) Mar 10, 2016:
Perhaps All we know that it is a recipe, so it may be on a private blog, not necessarily something they sell.
What I think they mean is that just because it is relatively healthy, it doesn't mean it doesn't offer the same pleasure as notoriously unhealthy sweets.
Sheila Wilson Mar 10, 2016:
Poor copy-writing, in my personal opinion I think they need to rethink their English version before going for a translation. However, they certainly haven't implied there's anything ugly about their product. That would be pretty awful marketing copy!
P.L.F. Persio Mar 10, 2016:
Kérem, Annamaria:-) I'm very curious about this recipe...
Annamaria Amik (asker) Mar 10, 2016:
Thanks! Missdutch, thanks a lot, I appreciate your clarifications.
P.L.F. Persio Mar 10, 2016:
Hi Annamaria! I think idea nr 1 is the correct one: it means the muffin is good for you, while tasting delicious; nothing to do with the muffin being ugly, which doesn't make sense anyway.
Many sweet recipes include vegetables, such as carrot, beetroot, even parsnip, the nice part, as well as chocolate, sugar, etc., the classic naughty ingredients.

Responses

+8
53 mins
Selected

as tasty as it is enticing self-indulgent

I was going to answer this before Phil did, but was interrupted. However, since he hasn't said what I was going to, I'll add my thoughts.

"Nice" is easy: it definitely means tasty, delicious, appetising. The trickier word here is "naughty".

There was an TV advertising campaign for cakes in the UK in the 1970s and 80s, with the slogan "Naughty, but nice". Supposedly the slogan was devised by the novelist Salman Rushdie, working as a copywriter, though actually the phrase goes back at least as far as a 1939 film starring Dick Powell and Ann Sheridan. If this text is British, I think there's a strong chance the writer was thinking of these adverts and expects some of his/her readers to remember them, as I do.

Naughty, as Phil has said, means wrong, but only mildly so, and above all it implies pleasurable wrongdoing, the pleasure of transgression. In relation to cakes or muffins, "naughty" really means "fattening". Also unhealthy, because of cholesterol, heart disease and all that, but above all departing from virtuous eating. So muffins are fattening and unhealthy because they're full of fats and carbohydrates.

However, this is supposed to be a healthy muffin, so I don't think they're using "naughty" to mean unhealthy, or even fattening, because that would contradict their message. I think the naughtiness here is mainly the pleasure of eating something you know you really shouldn't but that is very tempting, very nice, but in this case having the pleasure of giving yourself a treat without paying the full price in weight gain etc. "Naughty" can't actually mean "healthy", but it doesn't really mean "unhealthy" either. I would say it means tempting and self-indulgent, because eating muffins, even healthy ones, is a guilty pleasure, a departure from the path of dietary virtue.

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Note added at 53 mins (2016-03-10 06:52:59 GMT)
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I meant to put "enticingLY self-indulgent" in the answer box.

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Note added at 1 hr (2016-03-10 07:04:18 GMT)
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I think I've sent a somewhat confused message here. I would say that "naughty" in this context, even in the "Naughty but nice" cake ads, only means fattening or unhealthy indirectly. It mainly means pleasurely transgressive, the mildly guilty pleasure of doing something you know you really shouldn't.

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Note added at 1 hr (2016-03-10 07:18:43 GMT)
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That's how I see it too. Virtuous eating is a typically Anglo-Saxon protestant concept, I think: not just a means to the end of being thin and healthy, but something good in itself — virtue as its own reward. It's often said that the dullness of traditional English cooking is symptomatic of a culture that regards sensory pleasure as morally suspect. "Naughty" is a word mainly applied to children, and being naughty is fun simply for the fact of breaking the rules, in a culture that instils stifling conformity as an end in itself.
Note from asker:
Your answer is a real treat, thank you! :) 'Virtuous eating' almost sounds Aristotelian. I agree, nice and naughty here means it's packed with all the benefits of healthy foods AND pleasures of guilty foods.
Don't worry, the message was clear, I don't think anything suggested 'unhealthy' per se, just the pleasure generally associated with unhealthy foods.
Precisely! I commented on the same ethical-cultural aspects in the EN-HU pair. Here in Eastern Europe, good food traditionally means food that is tasty, and if it looks good, that's a bonus. But health-conscious eating has only recently come in vogue.
I think I'll keep this question open just so that I can learn more of this interesting stuff from you :)
Peer comment(s):

agree P.L.F. Persio : what a yummy answer;-)
1 hr
Thanks very much!
agree Tony M : Yes, naughty = indulgent, a guilty pleasure. "Soemthing you're not supposed to eat"; and I too think it is a nod back to that earlier GB cultural reference.
1 hr
Thanks, Tony! That's it exactly.
agree Noni Gilbert Riley : Immediately thought of naughty but nice too - I wonder if the slogan is known to those who weren't direct targets of that campaign, if, indeed, the expression has passed into general use. Any responses you young ones?
1 hr
Thanks, Noni! I wonder too, but I fear we're probably showing our age.
agree Sheila Wilson : I guess the young 'uns are wondering what it's all about. Interesting info about the original slogan being penned by Rushdie.
2 hrs
Thanks, Sheila. They probably are! Rushdie certainly did work as a copywriter and supposedly also devised "That'll do nicely" for American Express. And "Guinness is good for you" is supposed to have been thought up by Dorothy L. Sayers.
agree Arabic & More
5 hrs
Thanks, Amel :)
agree DLyons : Goes back to at least 1884 "New Catholic World", Volume 39. Also in 1934 "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town".
13 hrs
Thanks, Donal. The latter is "He's gonna find out who's naughty or nice" (slightly different), which must be where the Santa Claus ref. in the question comes from.
agree Jean-Claude Gouin : 'Healthy & tasty or ugly & tasty?' is NOT what it's all about. Charles, I like your COMMENTS and translation. Bravo! // I added a 2nd 'M' to 'comments' ...
17 hrs
Thank you very much, Jean-Claude!
agree acetran
4 days
Thanks, acetran :)
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4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Thanks a lot!"
+5
21 mins

delicious, but not very healthy

Naughty means sinful, but not in.a bad way. Like you say, it's a guilty pleasure, since the "healthy" muffin is presumably full of sugar. It's nothing to do with Santa Claus, though parents do say that he won't come if their children are naughty, ie badly behaved.
Note from asker:
I agree, thanks. And what do you think "as nice as it is naughty" means, given that delicious is already mentioned in the phrase?
Peer comment(s):

agree Gabriele Demuth : Yes, it is described as an "occasional treat", so it may be mentioned as part of a healthy diet, but this particular muffin would surely be full of sugar and fatt :)
33 mins
agree Jack Doughty
35 mins
agree Louisa Tchaicha
1 hr
neutral Charles Davis : Isn't it a bit strange to present a "healthy" muffin recipe as not very healthy? // It's a clue that "not very healthy" is probably not what "naughty" is intended to mean, and that's how our answers are different. Healthiness is not the issue, IMO.
1 hr
That's not our problem. Annamaria hasn't explained what she means by "healthy", but unless it's sugar free there's no such thing. I don't understand how your answer is different to mine.
agree Katherine Rutter
10 hrs
agree Yvonne Gallagher : I read it this way as well. It tastes great but is not necessarily a healthy treat (a guilty pleasure)
1 day 9 hrs
Something went wrong...
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