And so it has happened: Uncle Roger has met up with BBC Food host Hersha Patel to cook fried rice together.

The video appeared on YouTube late on Aug. 9, 2020 (Singapore time) and within five hours it clocked 800,000 views.

Highly-anticipated collaboration

The highly-anticipated collaboration between the comedian and food host was spurred on by a series of publicity plugs by the duo, as well as their easy chemistry -- despite their tumultuous beginning out of nowhere.

This came after Uncle Roger, a.k.a. Malaysian comedian Nigel Ng, did a reaction video in July to Patel cooking rice with a colander -- and demonstrating how Asians all died a little inside.

Patel was subsequently mercilessly trolled online as Uncle Roger's video -- with about 10 million views on YouTube -- exploded all over the globe overnight.

How did rice-cooking collaboration go?

Patel showed how she would cook basmati rice and fried rice -- and she washed the rice first before boiling it, but no rice cooker was utilised.

That was perhaps more than enough to signal that Patel is a bona fide rice-cooking Asian who knows what she is doing, but occasionally has to follow recipes prescribed for her as part of her hosting job for the BBC.

Patel remained self-deprecating throughout the latest video and took the jabs on the chin like a pro as she rolled with the punches in the form of Ng's punchlines as he remained in character.

That has been Patel's forte ever since she was put under the spotlight all of a sudden following the Uncle Roger roast.

The mean-spirited online comments directed at her have since abated, but it is not evident if the abuse had dented her confidence as she did her thing for the camera with her winsome smile on show.

She could have had a dozen different reactions, but she turned this into a win.

Uncle Roger innuendoes

Uncle Roger, on the other hand, went a tad further with his low-ball, body parts jokes and innuendo, as he channelled the boomer spirit.

It appeared almost as if Ng had to ham it up for the camera and set himself up to take some heat by sexualising the proceedings more than a few times.

That was either his edginess or contrition on show, as he is willing to offer himself as tribute on behalf of Patel now.

There were some gems though.

"Different culture make rice differently, just some culture is wrong," Uncle Roger said in the video, as if baiting self-righteous people to get triggered.

But based on the comments section of the YouTube video, the viewers loved every second of the 11-minute clip of two professionals in showbiz closing ranks.

One comment, with 8,500 likes at this time of writing, even suggested that Uncle Roger should have his own Netflix show.

You can watch Ng and Patel's publicity plug here about two weeks before the collaboration dropped:

Top photo via mrnigelng