What meal made your heart sink as a child

Lawd my mother could not cook for shit in the first place, she would let the peas boil dry and they would burn, I think we had grilled chops, lumpy mash, peas and carrots 4 or 5 nights a week, There was her spaghetti Bolognaise that consisted of boiled mince thickened with powdered gravy mix, with the occasional can of roma tomatoes added, we drowned it in tomato sauce to make it edible. Fish cakes of lumpy mash with tuna in oil added shaped into patties and lightly fried on each side, but the most gag worthy of all was the Sunday chicken dinner, A Boiled yes boiled, whole chicken, with peas, carrots & under cooked baby potatoes, the gravy was made from powdered gravy mix & the water from the vegetables, she boiled everything or threw it all in the pressure cooker, to add variety to meals she would sometimes add....Boiled chocos. She had no clue about, browning, sauteeing, braising, steaming or any other method of cooking, everything was boiled within an inch of it's life, most of what we ate was tasteless mush so I learned to cook at a very young age, mainly in self defense so I would not starve to death. I am very happy to say that I became an excellent cook, there are rarely any left overs in my house.

Cod roe
Gammon
Fried eggs
Oxtail soup
Spam or other cold meats of the pig variety
Parsnips
Home overgrown runnerbean beans that had gone purple and huge; dry, moisture-sucking beans from hell they were. Couldn't eat the actual bean case by then as they were like wood by then.

I realise none of these made a whole meal, but the presence of any one of them would make my heart sink as I had parents who came from the "not leaving the table until it's all gone" school of thought.

Mutton stew and proper Irish stew, made with lamb. I really don't like lamb now, and wouldn't eat mutton if you paid me.

But I love a nice big floury boiled spud with butter and salt, mmmmm..

When I was singing the praises of my mum's food I forgot about the runner beans.

Our neighbour used to grow them and she'd give us tons. She wouldn't pick them when they were young and tender. She'd let them grow to nearly 10 inches long so they were tough and stringy.

My mum would slice them and boil them until they were grey. They'd still be tough. They'd be slimy and watery yet but some witchcraft, still dry. We'd have them with every dinner from June to October.

All vegetables for Sunday lunch would be boiled for hours.

Mushrooms would be slowly fried until they shrank to black nipples.

She'd buy the nicest cuts of steak and then fry them slowly until they were like shoe leather. Just before she served them she'd squash them down in the pan with a spatula just to make sure there was absolutely no moisture left inside whatsoever.

Apart from that her food was great.

Anything involving mashed potato. E.g. cottage pie

Duelling I remember TVP mince! Just unutterably disgusting. Especially when padded out with lentils.

Baked bananas wrapped in ham with white sauce, with cheddar cheese sprinkled on top.

It was in a recipe book, so assumed to be edible. From memory, this assumption was mistaken.

Lentil soup or braised steak. My nana would put it on to start cooking about 8am. We ate at 6pm.

School dinner mashed swede.

Blancmange

Find us crispy pancakes
Beef olives
School dinner spam fritters.

They all still make me feel a bit queasy.

It's weird, because other than the tinned tomatoes, I can't think of any other meal/food that I would refuse/didn't like!

No wonder I was a chubby child, I always put my hand up for seconds!

Re the tinned tomatoes for school dinners - I always refused them in the line, but the dinner lady would then just spoon some of the "juice" on my plate "to try" thus rendering the rest of it in edible. Cow bag!

At school we used to get liver with baked beans and an undercooked shiny pink sausage. The juice from the liver and beans used to merge together in a vile, pukey looking mess and has given me a phobia about runny food touching other things on my plate. Vile.

You're right Calamitously, that sounds terrible!

Corned beef, boiled cabbage and boiled potatoes. Bleugh.

Tinned mackerel fillets in tomato sauce. Yeuch.

My kids don't know they're born!

Fray bentos steak and kidney pie, almost uncooked cooked chips and tinned peas, all kept warm and very dry in the oven, then served without any gravy or anything remotely moist. My mother was in hospital and my father was 'cooking' it was gross and he served it most days followed every day by a tub of strawberry mousse

[[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textured_vegetable_protein]] actually TVP

And Sprats. Little bony fish. Bleach.

Oh, and my dad used to cook this vegetarian meat substitute which I called TCP but am sure it wasn't really called that. It was horrific.

Pizza. Because we only ever had it when dad cooked and it was always burned.

Also stuffed marrow for obvious reasons like it tastes like shit.

Lastly bread and butter pudding because I have never ever understood why anyone would eat warm stale bread filled with warm raisins. BARF.

My mum isn't a bad cook, and I'm not very fussy, so there wasn't much I didn't eat. She had a bit of a thing for tinned prunes, and I still hate those. I used to hate smoked fish, but I love it now. Same with Brussels sprouts.

CalamitouslyWrong yes your right, ''a ball of flour'' as my Dad calls it without something is in fact a ball of flour, its horrid. If I had a ''ball of flour'' I'd make bread with it! I have memories of old stringy thready potatoes and crying because it was gross, been told to eat it.

Also I love mash, but my mother pawning off a peeled and mashed on the plate boiled potato as mash was a cop out. She used to do the raw onion added to the mash too as mentioned upthread. You'd have smooth creamy mash and suddenly a hard, raw lump of strong onion, usually with beans on top