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Original poster

To be raging at shortbread instead of pastries?

208 replies

pinotnow · 12/06/2025 09:40

I am at a conference type event. As a teacher I rarely get to come on this type of thing. I've looked forward to the pastries on arrival throughout the two hour drive. I'm here and there are no pastries. It's biscuits of a shortbread type, which I don't like anyway and are not appropriate as a substitute for pastries. I haven't eaten so it's going to be a long morning until lunch, which I now have concerns about anyway.

Why is everything so relentlessly fucking shit now?

OP posts:
EasierToWalkAway · 13/06/2025 17:14

I empathise completely. There are so few perks to being a teacher for these days. They could at least have given you that one!

pastapestoparmesan · 13/06/2025 17:07

No pastries at mine today (also a teacher) but Jude’s ice cream at lunch ftw!

nomas · 13/06/2025 17:06

DifferentChild · 12/06/2025 09:47

With you on that @pinotnow shortbread is a shit substitute for a good cinnamon whirl or chocolate croissant. Hope your day gets better😃

You get those high end pastries? We just get mini croissants and mini danish type things.

There was one halcyon day they had mini eclairs and macarons.

MrsHamlet · 13/06/2025 17:01

There were hot drinks AND squash at lunch today.

Navyslug · 13/06/2025 16:52

MousePolice · 12/06/2025 09:52

I travelled 2.5 hrs to a conference once and they served apples with the coffee. Apples and coffee on arrival, more apples and coffee at 11.30. At 2 they served a tiny sandwich lunch and it closed at 4.30. My stomach was rumbling throughout!

What! That is a hate crime!

LividVermiciousKnid · 13/06/2025 16:48

pinotnow · 12/06/2025 13:18

No mints or foxes fruits on the tables either, ffs

Lunch has been OK aside from a weird beef kofta thing that looked like...well, you can guess. But now there's no fucking post Lunch tea or coffee. We're going to have to wait until 2 fucking 30 ..

All I'm saying is I sense a northern football venue of the blue variety in this shit provisioned teacher-hosting venue, having had the misfortune of two days there myself recently.

And they're stingy with the posh fish fingers.

Jabberwok · 13/06/2025 16:45

I feel your pain, in the days when I had a proper grown up job, I often attended meetings, conferences etc away from the office. We once had while week meeting in the same hotel. It was the same buffet days one and two....day three kinda went bottom up at lunchtime....we went out for chips/greggs/Tescos meal deals days 4 & 5.

WiddlinDiddlin · 13/06/2025 16:39

I don't think having a light hearted moan about expecting the standard thing and then getting the non-standard, crappier thing is entitled or sad.

But then I have a sense of humour and I don't go to free conferences, I've always paid a fairly high (often bloody exhorbitant) fee to attend!! I don't see where the OP said this was a free conference? - edit - ah I see it now.

Still think its a bloody liberty to switch pastries for shortbread!

KaleQueen · 13/06/2025 14:43

JudgeJ · 12/06/2025 22:17

Oh but it can, it was quite a long time coming. I don't know how some people manage life with absolutely no sense of humour!
We once had an LEA organised weekend conference, on the Friday there was a free bar before dinner. It wasn't available the following year, can't think why! Possible because two delegates didn't leave their rooms until Sunday lunch.

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I’ve got a sense of humour thanks 😂 i keep it next to my social conscience. It takes up the space where my lack of entitlement sits. I attend lots of conferences too. And organise them. For a publicly-funded body. They cost thousands and thousands to run. Thousands of pounds of public money. Budgeting is always tricky. So is catering for dietary requirements, allergies, etc. And there’s always someone who uses the feedback form to moan about the fact it was a sandwich lunch or lack of endless teas and coffees or whatever. Makes me feel sad for them. Like this lady. She’s got a great job and food provided for free and raging about pastries 😬 oh sorry was her post meant to be funny? I mean, it’s not that funny is it? Really? It’s just a bit sad.

InterestedDad37 · 13/06/2025 09:47

Though partial to shortbread biscuits, I too would be deeply disappointed by the lack of pastries - if lunch is below par, recruit some other participants, and stage a 'dirty protest' 😉😀

rosemarble · 13/06/2025 09:44

banivani · 13/06/2025 09:11

The trauma was re-awakened by this thread.

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😂 There must be some sort of support group for repressed mini-dessert disappointments.

banivani · 13/06/2025 09:11

rosemarble · 12/06/2025 12:39

This was 13 years ago....time to let it go!

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The trauma was re-awakened by this thread.

Needacupofteaandcrackers · 12/06/2025 23:38

at school dinners there was chocolate shortcake….. mumsnet…it was legendary….. stuff of dreams …sadly .i have never been able to recreate it …… 🥲🥲🥲

BristolDolly22 · 12/06/2025 23:05

one of the last teaching conferences I went on had little tiny bacon and sausage butties…that made my day.

Fgfgfg · 12/06/2025 22:48

Just browsing MN after a long day at a conference.
Sorry to tell you @pinotnow but there were pastries. They weren't the little ones either. I went for the fresh fruit platter instead. Pineapple, grapes, melon, and kiwi. It was very nice.
Ed. And strawberries

HÆLTHEPAIN · 12/06/2025 22:20

MumbleBumbleAppleCrumble · 12/06/2025 09:49

Also, all those people saying that shortbread is shit. It’s like those people who say sex is a bit dull: you’re either crazy or you’re not doing it right. Good shortbread is the stuff of dreams. Soft, sweet, crumbly. My grandmother used to make the absolute best.

I concur wholeheartedly. I also make fab shortbread.

JudgeJ · 12/06/2025 22:17

Disturbia81 · 12/06/2025 19:58

This can’t be a real reply..

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Oh but it can, it was quite a long time coming. I don't know how some people manage life with absolutely no sense of humour!
We once had an LEA organised weekend conference, on the Friday there was a free bar before dinner. It wasn't available the following year, can't think why! Possible because two delegates didn't leave their rooms until Sunday lunch.

Disturbia81 · 12/06/2025 19:58

KaleQueen · 12/06/2025 16:31

How entitled. Why do you expect pastries? 😂 sort your own breakfast? 😂 If this is what it takes to get you raging I’d hate to see you deal with food poverty which many pupils face in their own homes each day where there isn’t even any shortbread.

This can’t be a real reply..

WearyAuldWumman · 12/06/2025 19:50

Once went to a Scottish Qualifications Authority event held at Murrayfield Stadium.

The main entrance was locked. No notice. Many of us hapless teachers had to walk half the circumference of the stadium to find a door.

When we finally got in, I told an SQA official about the problem. "Oh, we've got a moaner here! No tea and biscuits for her!"

"You think I really care about tea and biscuits? Don't you DARE argue with a menopausal woman!"

To add insult to injury, the biscuits were only custard creams and/or jammy dodgers.

Illegally18 · 12/06/2025 19:18

MumbleBumbleAppleCrumble · 12/06/2025 16:21

Sadly, it’s not her recipe - which was actually her mother’s (my great grandmother was a cook in a stately home in the early 1900s) - that seems to be the thing, as that seems to just be the run of the mill shortbread recipe, it was her magic touch!

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I'll have to carry on dreaming about her buttery shortbread then.

Pinkyplat · 12/06/2025 19:04

KaleQueen · 12/06/2025 16:31

How entitled. Why do you expect pastries? 😂 sort your own breakfast? 😂 If this is what it takes to get you raging I’d hate to see you deal with food poverty which many pupils face in their own homes each day where there isn’t even any shortbread.

🍪

WiddlinDiddlin · 12/06/2025 18:17

Shocking.

I once did a 3 day conference where not only was there only vegan offerings, and not brilliant ones at that ... but day 1 and 2 there was zero cake of any kind.

Day 3 there was copious cake, possibly because it looked like there'd be a riot if we were not topped up to our expected 3 days worth of cake.

pinkglitter12 · 12/06/2025 17:59

I'd quit. Hand in your notice and be done with these peasants.

MrsHamlet · 12/06/2025 17:54

I think we're at the same event. No hot drinks at lunch time? Not acceptable.

KaleQueen · 12/06/2025 16:31

How entitled. Why do you expect pastries? 😂 sort your own breakfast? 😂 If this is what it takes to get you raging I’d hate to see you deal with food poverty which many pupils face in their own homes each day where there isn’t even any shortbread.