Is your family is snobby when it comes to homemade dishes

If only every family could be more like this, maybe the country’s health problems wouldn’t be so bad. Unfortunately, not everyone has the available funds to buy everything fresh, enough time or the skills to make delicious & nutritious food.

I don’t think it’s snobby at all. I think it’s lovely. My husband is diabetic & has high blood pressure, so we always look to minimise the levels of salt & sugar in our food, while still keeping it tasty, and cooking from scratch helps us do just that.

My partner is Italian and always cooks from scratch. I've come to appreciate it too. We are what we eat and it's also better for the planet. So I don't think it's snobby I think it's sensible. Also cheaper most of the time.

The shop bought may be as nice but does it contain additives, salt, sugar? I try not to eat much sugar or salt and can never get over how many shop bought foods contain quite a lot of both.

Tinned soup contains both sugar and salt. Why sugar? I make lots of soap and never ever have put sugar in it. If I put salt in it is very little

Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's frozen pea hummus is fantastic!

Discerning not snobby. If I were a decent cook I’d probably be the same!

@venusandmarsI think we may have the same mind as this is me to a T. Cooking and baking makes my brain go Zen, even the planning and shopping and prepping.

Snobby isn't the right word for it.
In general home made food will be nicer, fresher and less full of additives. My son is vegan but eats a lot of convenience food which seems very UPF heavy, I'm doubtful that this is healthier than my non vegan diet.
It's also nice and usually appreciated to have a home cooked dinner or a homemade cake.

But it is perhaps a bit ... narrow minded to have a horror of every single item of convenience food on principle. Some of it is really nice and also hugely time saving. It wouldn't be realistic to expect working people to make every single thing from scratch and with a lot of things the superiority of home made over shop bought is marginal. I once spent ages making Mulligatawny Soup from scratch. I tasted it and was delighted as it was just like the Heinz one from the tin. Then thought "oh, wait a minute ..."

Edited as I also meant to say that there are plenty of people in the reverse position. There are folk at my work who won't touch homemade cake "because they don't like the idea of someone's bare hands on it" but will tuck into a Tesco cake which arrived in sealed packaging because they know it's "clean".

Personally I strongly prefer freshly cooked food made with wonderful ingredients . I love it when people make an effort.

I made a vegan wellington for my SIL last year and I was gleeful - it was such fun to make! I did a trial run so I could balance the flavour and texture.

Its snot 'snobby' to prefer to eat home cooked food rather than mass produced crap full of salt and additives....

Sounds like they’re just passionate about food… not snobby.

But then I also grow food, make my own jam and freeze unbaked cookies so my husband always has homemade treats.

That is just weird - it comes from a place of insecurity? Maybe it comes from a place of wanting, and liking, to eat whole natural foods. I do.

Cooking is my relaxing hobby, in the same way that other people like knitting or playing squash or buying handbags. I come home after a stressful day flying to business meetings and I'll wind down by making a big pot of soup. I enjoy the planning, pouring over recipes, I even enjoy the shopping. It feels like an act of love and care to cater for everyone's individual needs. At Christmas we will have someone with a milk allegry, someone with a nut allergy, two people who are vegetarian, bordering on vegan. It's a delightful challenge to deliver celebratory food to them all.

But I've never made my own croissants feeling a bit inadequate

Yeah. I’ve tried dried. I’ve tried canned. It’s just a bit bleurgh when I make it.

I apologise for diverting the thread onto how to make good tasting hummus.

I wouldn’t think it was snobby, more like interested in tasty food, creative and generous in putting in time to make things that taste generally better than commercial dishes which are ultimately made for profit and contain additives and preservatives for shelf life. I would also add I think it’s a caring thing to do, wanting to make it special for everyone which if you’ve got the time and the inclination is to be encouraged. Enjoy eating it all, sounds fab!

I'm easily influenced, apparently, as I'm off to make some hummus for lunch after reading this thread. Bloody love hummus.

(For special occasions I soak dried chickpeas, pressure cook them and rub the skins off but for lunch I'll simmer a tin of them for 10 minutes with a bit of bicarb then whizz them up)

Where's the snobby part?

This has made me giggle...

When I was little I envied those who bought ready meals, shopped at M&S, Booths etc.
We grew up with homemade produce Inc. Tomato Ketchup. My grandparents had a vast vegetable plot in the garden, my uncle had an allotment (I still hate courgette season).

I never see homemade as snobby. I used to dream of such delights of chicken kiev balls and fries!

It's not snobby to have taste buds!

It also certainly not insecure to appreciate quality goods and taste.

There's a massive difference between a mass produced, delivery days on the shelf, supermarket cake and a freshly based one.

This. Homemade food is delicious. I enjoy cooking and baking when I’ve got time and if I have guests I’d much prefer to give them home cooked food. I don’t think it’s snobby.

Homemade food with ingredients you know, which are natural and selected from real food or Frankenstein flavourings, additives, plastic, arrested chemical? This isn't just UPF it's rip off the idiots UPF.

Its not snobby, I just prefer to know whats in something, plus I can make much better food than 99% of Ready Meals

I couldn't blame them at all for rejecting a cake from Tesco! Have you actually ever read the list of ingredients in supermarket cakes? They look lovely but are stuffed full of additives/chemicals.

There is one vegetarian family member and my sister in law is going to make an entire veggie wellington just for him. I suggested just getting something from M&S and she completely baulked at the very idea.

God bless your SIL! As the first vegetarian in the family it was depressing to be given some ready meal thing when everyone else ate gorgeous, homemade luxury food. I offered to make something for myself but they would turn me down saying they'd got it sorted, but be given yet another ready-made hunk of bland.

Real, homemade food is just a thousand times better than mass produced crap. I wouldn't waste the calories on a Tesco cake if there was a possibility of a decent homemade cake.

Your inlaws aren't snobby, they are foodies who have a palette and time to spend on food prep. You are the one out of synch.

It’s not snobby and for some it’s just easy. My Dad had a restaurant, unfortunately my parents broke up when I was young but my stepdad was also a good cook. My Mum and stepdad taught me traditional English cooking and my Father taught me Chinese cooking. I helped in kitchens from a very young age. It just tastes better and far less additives.

Hilariously I make mine with dried chickpeas because that's what Ottolenghi tells me to do. I sometimes also go through the massive insane faff of deskinning them. I also watch Instagram videos on the secrets of the various humous-making cultures.

It still tastes - not shite, exactly, but not as good as 'posh' supermarket ones and definitely not as good as restaurant ones.

Annoying because I am vegan and I need the bloody protein.

I think it sounds much nicer but if you haven’t got time to make something can’t you just take something simple? Eg a fruit salad.

At work lots of people bake cakes but when it’s my birthday I bring in ones from a shop. I just say I haven’t had time to bake anything, which is true. People always eat the cakes. If they didn’t we would just leave them for the next team.

Your in laws can’t force you to bring something homemade. I personally would like it because at least you know you are getting something nice and good for you to eat. I have eaten loads and loads of rubbish recently after a bereavement and I definitely feel the difference. I feel groggy and rubbish. I would love someone to cook me a home cooked meal. I couldn’t be bothered to make one for someone at the moment though and I would just say that. No sorry I can’t at the moment as I don’t have time.