UK consumers last night pledged to buy British, unless there was an obviously superior German alternative.
As the economic war of words between London and Berlin escalated, millions of Britons said they would be happy to boycott German goods as long as it did not involve Volkswagen, Mercedes, Audi, Becks, Lowenbrau, Knorr chicken stock cubes and those chocolate eggs with the toy inside.
Germany, meanwhile, said it would boycott British goods as soon as it could find any.
Dr Tom Logan, an economist at the German-owned University of Reading, said: "If I was a confused recession-hit country looking for advice, I'd probably go with Germany, given that they still have an actual economy based on making stuff that people want to buy.
"Meanwhile, the British 'economy' seems to be based on selling each other money so that we can buy high quality German goods."
German finance minister Peer Steinbruck said: "Let's think, what could we boycott? Cars? Oh yeah, like everyone else in the world I really wanted a Rover 200. Ah, but what about the Mini, you say? Or the 'BMW Mini', to give it its full Bavarian title."
He added: "Beer? Yeah, we drink loads of British beer, it's sooo good. So I guess that means we'll just have to boycott Tizer and Jaffa Cakes."
Chancellor Alistair Darling said: "I will be boycotting a wide range of German goods and services apart from Aldi, obviously. It's so much cheaper. How do they manage it? Those Germans really do know what they're doing.
"And also those big hotdog sausages that come in a jar. Bloody love those."
