Food snobs

[AlaskaElfForGin]

We've just returned from a couple of days away and stayed with a friend of DHs and her new husband. Very nice people and had a lovely time.

BUT. He is the most dreadful food snob and insists that the 'right' way of cooking is the only way. As an example, we had taken some steaks from the local farm shop down and some nice wine etc. He cooked the steaks on New Year's day and as he started DH said 'Oh Alaska and I like ours medium please'. We were told with a pitiful look that 'there's only one way I'll be cooking these steaks and that's the right way'. All very jolly and we laughed etc., bit he was dead serious. I didn't eat mine, nor did DH. I don't want a rare/blue steak thank you and he point blank refused to stick them back on the griddle which he had stuck in the sink to stop us doing it ourselves. 😂 'Just eat it - it's the right way to eat steak'.

There were many, many similar examples over the stay. Poached eggs which were so underdone the white was still jelly like and cold). I wanted to make my own perfectly normal runny poached eggs but he was very possessive of their kitchen! Who says everyone should eat things the same way??

Have you experienced any similar nonsense?

Sounds like a shit cook and host to me

He's not nice, he's a controlling cunt. You wasted two steaks rather than stand up to this twat. 'I'm NOT wasting this steak,' get up and put them in a frying pan. I fucking hate rare meat. Even worse, people who sneer at how others like their food. That would be the last time I ever stayed with them.

I’m a rare steak eater (well I am when not pregnant anyway sad ) as is DH, and we do inwardly cringe when MIL asks for her expensive steak cooked to a crisp. Ditto eggs - nothing worse than overdone.

And you say that with a straight face before going on to say how rude it is not to do what another person prefers? You are just as snobby as the person in the OP.

He may be nice in other ways but he is a bad patronising host.

My friend loves her steak basically wafted over a candle, I rarely eat steak but like it medium I don't want blood all over my plate thanks. Never once has she questioned my preference.

Being a good host (or a good person in general) means accepting we are all different and accommodating guests. (Unless they are really bad guests of course)
I would have told him he obviously wasn't the brilliant cook he thought he was as there are many ways to cook most foods and not one of them is the "right" way. Tell him he is obviously a one trick pony😉

I'd happily identify as a food snob* but that bloke sounds like a food fascist.

*Others may disagree, because I don't like my steak bleeding and I don't do raw shellfish or eggs at all, but I could be a real pain in the arse re: cheese, chocolate and wine.

What did he say when your steak was left uneaten OP?

In my youth, a zillion yrs ago, I worked in a very upscale restaurant. The chefs were all food snobs but completely understood peoples diff tastes.
Rare, medium or burnt to a cinder, these (now) VERY famous chefs took it all in their stride. Your ignorant friend is not a nice person, he is a rude twat.

I like my steak so a good vet could resuscitate it, but what's important is how the person eating that particular steak, wants their steak, and will enjoy eating their steak - and being able to do it that way for them, and to ensure they can enjoy eating it because they're not feeling at all judged for how they happen to enjoy their steak.

That's a nice person and a good cook. What you're describing is an ignorant, arrogant, twunt, who thinks he's far better in the kitchen than he really is.

I like my steak pink but not bloody. DH prefers his wandering a bit to close to the grill on the way from the farm to his plate. Neither of us are wrong.

You would only be wrong if you ordered a steak tartare in a restaurant.

I love to cook and don't use jars etc. but this kind of thing drives me nuts.

How can you cringe at the temperature another person wants their meat cooked to? Like how on earth would it even bother you or cross your mind. Ditto eggs. It isn't a sign of moral depravity or lack of intelligence or sophistication to prefer well cooked eggs. It is just a preference. weird.

that man was incredibly rude. He sacrificed his friends' comfort on the altar of his food snobbery - and slaughtered 2 steaks as an apeasement to the food snob gods. weird.

When I do a pan of scrambled eggs for the family, I dish most of it up all creamy and gorgeous and then hand the pan to ds for him to kill the remaining eggs by cooking them for another 5 minutes until they are dry and crusty. We all think what he does to the eggs is hideous, but I would never forbid him, nor shame him for it, nor would I expect him to eat things just because I like them.

Your friend is not a food snob. He is a mannerless food tyrant - and a very poor host.