The Dowager Butterworth, Paula Deen, has allegedly taken an interesting tactic in defending herself against that explosive lawsuit filed by a former employee, accusing her of racism, sexual harassment, and assault: the National Enquirer reports she's just given a deposition in which she admits that "Yes, of course" she throws around racial slurs at work and thinks an elegant idea for a wedding might be to staff it with black men pretending to be slaves. Who doesn't? We're all Americans here, right?

The Enquirer purports to have obtained video of Deen's May 17 legal deposition, in which the Food Network star was questioned for three hours on topics ranging from racist jokes:

“It’s just what they are — they’re jokes…Most jokes are about Jewish people, rednecks, black folks....I didn’t make up the jokes, I don’t know...I can’t, myself, determine what offends another person...”

...to the inspiration behind her idea to staff her brother Bubba Hiers' wedding with black men pretending to be slaves (turns out it struck her when she had dinner at a restaurant where the waitstaff reminded her of slaves):

"The whole entire waiter staff was middle-aged black men, and they had on beautiful white jackets with a black bow tie.

I mean, it was really impressive. That restaurant represented a certain era in America…after the Civil War, during the Civil War, before the Civil War…It was not only black men, it was black women…I would say they were slaves."

The filer of the lawsuit, Lisa Jackson (the former general manager of a Savannah restaurant owned by Deen and her brother) claimed last year that the chef specifically expressed her desire for bevy of tap dancing "little n***ers" to send her brother off to married life with Southern flair. (Unfortunately, Deen allegedly decided against that plan out of fear the media might somehow twist her cute idea into something racist.)

In her suit, Jackson alleges Deen said, “Well what I would really like is a bunch of little n***ers to wear long-sleeve white shirts, black shorts and black bow ties, you know in the Shirley Temple days, they used to tap dance around. Now, that would be a true Southern wedding wouldn’t it? But we can’t do that because the media would be on me about that.”

In her deposition, Deen acknowledges that the discussion took place, but denies using a racial slur.

Perhaps in honor of Juneteenth, she can roast marshmallows over a flaming cross.

UPDATE: Scroll down to the bottom of this post for a complete transcript of Deen's deposition.

[Enquirer // Image via Splash]

To contact the author of this post, email caity@gawker.com.