Childhood dinners that made your heart sink?

[Harveypuss]

A lighthearted post!

Do you remember any childhood meals, that when you asked your mum (or dad) "what's for dinner?", their answer made your heart sink?!

Mine was Lamb's hearts. My Mum cooked these often, presumably it was a culinary delight and was probably cheap, but I hated them (this was back in the late 70s so you ate what was given or went hungry). I don't know what she did with them, but they were as tough as old boots and really chewy. I'm sure offal like that is probably quite delicious in some top-end restaurant but dear Mum didn't cook it like that! I'm in my 50s now and I've only just told her I hated that meal. She was mortified!

We have this with our son now, aged 17. He hates pasta and when we have a family pasta meal, I cook him something different. He's off to Uni next year, so don't know how he's going to manage as I'm told all students live of pasta as it's really cheap...!

What was your least favourite childhood meal...?

Liver
Oxtail soup

My Mother was a good cook and one day she gave us a meal of meat and gravy and stuffing. It was really rich and tasted truly lovely, BUT she then smiled as she told me it was stuffed lambs hearts.

That is the only time in my life I vomited on instinct.

Not tried them since - it envy

@Weedsnseeds1

MindtheBelleek, guessing you are from Cork? I'd eat any of those, if cooked well, my Mother has, I kid you not, on more than one occasion, served me a single, microwaved, canned, plum tomato as lunch

Let’s swap mothers?

There must be ways of cooking tripe so that it’s not a crime against humanity, but they didn’t happen in our house...

Youngest of 11. Dinner was served at 12.30 did not get home till 3. Left.over a pot. Sunday lamb leftover on monday.Tuesday cows heart potatoes and turnip..wednesday stew made with.oxtails carrots and spuds. Thursday ox tounge cabbage and spuds. Friday fried fish chips and beans. Sardines in oil.for tea. Saturday fried rib steak with.onions.
Since i married i have.not.cooked one of these meals. Desert.every.day
Stewed apples.rice pudding semolina tapioca bread and butter pudding. Sunday was trfle and ice-cream
Menu never chanaged

NOT envy I meant

@ladylockdown

I would never buy broad beans but DH and DD9 like them. The trick is to remove the inner bean from the leathery outer coat - that’s the part that’s tough and bitter.

Smoked haddock, my dm used to poach it in milk and use the milk to make a sauce. It's the one fish I still can't eat

Stuffed heart is another one.

“I’m going out tonight, dinner’s in the fridge, put it in the oven for 20 mins”.

Sorry - I love liver....strangely though I'm the only one in my family now who will have it ! My mum used to make it as a family meal but not very often.

Steamed fish with boiled potatoes, white cabbage and parsley sauce. Urgh.

A tasteless, mushy plate of beige.

School shepards pie - still can't face lamb mince. It was grey and watery but slime at the same time

My mum, bless her, is not the world's best cook but nothing as bad as the shepards pie springs to mind.

Popcornbetty simple prose cannot describe the reality of her cooking.
Evenwhen following a recipe, her substitutions are hair raising. "I made lamb tagine, I couldn't get preserved lemons or dried apricots, so I used bananas and canned peaches instead, it was delicious and X (taste bud dead bloke she has hooked up with after my father died) loved it".

Pork chops, so dry you had to chew each mouthful for 10 minutes before you could swallow. Followed by baked apple, mushy, tasteless, searingly hot with shrivelled raisins on top. 😭

@Clawdy

Steak and kidney pie. Mum would say "Just leave the pieces of kidney at the side of your plate." But the whole thing tasted of kidney!

Totally with you on that one. Ugh.

[quote EastWestWhosBest]My mum is an amazing cook. I actually miss the liver and onions she used to cook and I’ve been vegi for 25 years.

The only thing that I just wouldn’t eat was bobotie.
It’s minced lamb with spices and fruit with a topping like a mossaka.
www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/bobotie[/quote]
That looks nice !

Chowder. I'm not sure why, because I like all the components but just the smell of it put me off.

Fish. Any fish. I loathed it as a child. It made me retch. I just couldn't eat it and got nothing else, so went hungry. I remember begging not to do the washing up on fish night because I'd be scrubbing the vast pans (big family) and gagging into the sink. Didn't start eating fish until I was almost thirty. I love it now.

@gollymissdolly

Potted heid 🤢

Potted what ?

Takes a lot to turn my stomach but this thread makes me feel queasy, especially “liver with vessels” 🤢

Dm was a brilliant cook but she used to make neck of lamb stew because df loved it. The meat went in on the bones and it used to make me shudder. I was always relieved to be told I could have toast if I wasn't hungry as I invariably wasn't when that was on the menu.
Gammon with broad beans and parsley sauce was another meal I preferred the toast option as well.

My mum made the most god-awful lamb stew. It was thin and greasy and watery, and had horrible bits of carrot in it. It was truly awful. I've never told her how disgusting it was or how much I hated it.

I love Spam.

MindtgeBelleek the trick with tripe is to ignore British or Irish recipes completely. Tripe and onions is a bland abomination, no matter how well cooked.
Tripe is the offal equivalent of tofu, you need to add flavour to what is, essentially a flavourless protein.
Spain, France and Poland all have great recipes, plus China, Thailand, Vietnam.

Braising steak, Marrowfat processed peas and tinned potatoes.

All the fucking time. Two or three times a week at least.

DSIS and I hated everything there.
Normal steaks? Would be lovely. Boiled to death braising steak? Ew.
Garden peas? Yum! But those powdery half mushy pea things? Nasty.
And tinned potatoes???? Fucking tinned?

And the reason we ate these all the time was not financial, time restraints, ease or mum preference. It was because it's what her boyfriend liked. We could only ever eat his favourite meals and I assume his mother was a shit cook because his meal tastes were awful.

As a mother myself my kids get to eat a whole range of meals. Some they like, some they can eat but don't exactly like it (but I don't force them to eat things they genuinely hate) and I have never, ever cooked braising steak here. And I never will.

Mostly everything my Mother cooked, she was atrocious, I weighed 6 stones when I left school, just wasn't interested in food. I went to grans for a delicious Sunday lunch and swore I'd learn to cook like her.

Coddle - the dinner of nearly every house in Dublin but fuck is it horrible, 40 years later I still hate it!

@GingerFigs I came on to say the same, cauliflower cheese as a main! I love cheese but was always still so hungry afterwards. It used to come with slices of tomato baked on top.

Omelette. Same problem, too small and light to fill us up and took forever to cook, always the go-to option when dinner was already so late we were very hungry so the smell and the wait was hard!

On reflection, it was more the portions than the taste.

Cooked nicely, I confess I do like liver and bacon.