As a guest, what's the stingiest thing you've ever experienced?

[Marssuri]

Just that!
I'll start

I invited friends for dinner at mine. I made traditional dishes from where I'm from, sausage rougail, chicken cari and dessert.

A few days later they text me telling me to come to theirs for some food at dinner time.

I show up and bring a small jar of chilli peppers. One of the people who invited me goes "is that all you're going to eat?". I was confused and asked what they meant. They replied "It's everyone brings their own food."
I told them I thought they had invited me for dinner and they go "yes, we invited you to come to the house for dinner!".
They saw my face and said "don't worry, we can share some food with you!" before cutting a couple of raw carrots, aubergines, cherry tomatoes with some white sauce and putting them in the middle of the table.
They then served each other the meal they had made for themselves and digged in.

Note from MNHQ - we've had lots of nominations for this thread to be moved over to Mumsnet Classics and, as we're very generous hosts, we've done exactly this.

Surely the people (i.e. you) telling the poster who shared her experience that she was unreasonable to expect non-GF food are the ones policing the thread?

At 950 posts, thread seems to be doing fine.

A man like my father who is too weak to stand up to my step-mother and does anything for an easy life. I blame him as much as I blame her as he has never had my back where she is concerned; evil bitch!

You think they were right to serve OP and her kids miniature portions but big portions to FIL?

And he’s not coeliac, because he puts toast in OP’s toaster at her house. No coeliac does that due to risk of contamination.

That does not sound like enough food to be fair, with no room for those who want extra and variety. Not as bad as you first made it sound unless it was the absolutely most massive bowl of salad of course.

Don't see anything wrong with alcohol free wedding. As long as there were loads of sandwiches and cake I don't see the issue either

Another PP said the stingiest they know are actually overweight so very probably don’t “eat like a bird”. I have to admit our old neighbours eat excessively just not when hosting and certainly when they are hosted by us. I actually think it comes down to greed and they (stingy people in general I mean, not my old neighbours) might not want to share their food with others. Eg Will make a big platter of something but want to keep it back for their dinner for the next several days MN style.

I have found this thread actually quite interesting because I’ve always wondered people are like this when they don’t need to be.

Not an example of being stingy at all but threads like this always make me smile! When we were younger, BC, we regularly invited a couple of friends for dinner before we hit the town and vice versa. One evening they brought a bottle of wine that we didn't get round to drinking so next time we took it to their place and this went on for a couple of years! Eventually we decided to have a ceremonial opening of the bottle and I am here to tell you the Yugoslav Riesling does not improve with age!
BC= Before Children!

Did the parents not say its time to go home now as we are having our tea?
When my friends came round to play my mum would say, off home now,it's teatime.
Same with my kids. There was no expectation that they would be fed, unless there had been a specific invite to tea

Of course. Would've been rude to refuse but it was the death knell on our friendship.

they know though don’t they. It’s a judgment on the other people they are inviting I think. I’m quite keen to stay slim so watch what I eat but I know that’s my issue so if you come for a buffet as some friends did on nye then I’m absolutely determined that they get no whiff of my bonkers attitude to food and both food and wine are flowing.

The father had previously had a massive go at my friend shouting that someone had been putting toilet paper down the loo again... (it was me, so I figured I wasn't supposed to do that).
I guess they had a septic system or something, as they were rural, but even so I'd never heard of not putting loo paper in the loo.

So yeah he actually examined the loo paper I'd put in the bin and shouted at them that there was only "a bit of wet" on it.

Stinginess is a mindset in my view and has a lot to do with not valuing your guests. This can be particularly obvious at weddings where the bride and groom focus on having an expensive venue rather than thinking of their guests' enjoyment.

Last year my daughter and her DH and a group of old friends went to the wedding of a very good friend I will call Jane. It was a long way from where they all live and so required two nights stay. It was going to be expensive but Jane raved about how wonderful the venue was so they were all really looking forward to it. DD and her friends clubbed together and gave an extremely generous gift towards an the honeymoon in Kenya.

The night before the wedding Jane and husband to be invited 5 close friends and their partners for a meal at a very expensive restaurant where everyone paid for themselves. My DD and her friends offered to pay for Jane and husband to be and this was quickly accepted.

The wedding itself was at a hugely grand and expensive venue where they were treated to one glass of wine with some very meagre canapes and half a glass of fizz for the toasts over a period of 5 hours. They kept expecting more food to materialise, but it never did. They were all so hungry they had to buy sandwiches at an all night garage on the way back to their overnight accommodation.

Jane said it had always been her dream to get married at this venue - and she does have some amazing photos of her looking beautiful descending a staircase that would not look out of place in Buckingham Palace. But she seemed to have completely forgotten about the experience for her guests. DD and her friends are all in less well paid employment than Jane and her husband and attending the wedding cost them more than they could easily afford. They felt the guests had effectively paid for Jane to have the wedding (and honeymoon) she had wanted.

DD and her DH by comparison had a much more modest wedding (which was all they could afford) but provided lots of good food and an open bar at a very modest venue. They saw it as a special party and wanted all their guests to have a great time. Her friends all say it was one of the best weddings they have been to, while they are still moaning about how greedy Jane was at what they have voted Worst Wedding of All Time.

I went to a wedding which was described as a "tea dance" on the invitation.
It was a very big do in the community hall.
We got two very small triangular cheese sandwiches and a cup of tea. Then one fondant fancy and a glass of white wine for the toasts.
They'd pushed the boat out in other respects, so I did think it was a bit mean.

I went to this woman's house and she never even offered me a drink. I had to ask if I could have one because I was so thirsty. She grudgingly gave me a glass of water.

Not as a just a guest, but I was asked to help a son of my friends cram for his uni entrance exam and I went to theirs on a Friday night and left on a Sunday night. 8 hours of straight tutoring every day. My head was spinning. But I was young then and did not know how to stick up for myself. For lunch (we started cramming at 9 am) they would provide a sandwich, a glass of diluted squash and a packet of crisps. For dinner half a chicken breast and 2 potatoes each. I don't think I have ever been so hungry in my life. I took a piece of bread and spread some ketchup on it, just to get some carbs in, and their son, the shit I was tutoring said 'One simply does not do that - go to people's houses and spreading ketchup on bread'. I said nothing and I still hate myself for it. And the parents (my friends!!!!) did not tell him to shut up - I was cramming with him for free, as a favour.

That's a quick stereotyping of cultures done by one experience.

In most cultures, it is shameful to be stingy.

I agree in some cultures, people cook elaborate meals. But even in my culture which is famous for it's food and considered very welcoming to guests, there is an unspoken hierarchy of guests. So not sure why such threads attract posters to talk about their culture being better.

In fairness, @Ihearyousingingdownthewire, she did come back and say that, when he visits her house, he happily uses her toaster, without any apparent worry about cross contamination, so she thinks it may be a gluten intolerance rather than coeliac disease.

Well my three children and I regularly share a pizza but we do have dessert! 😅😅 and growing up I’d often have small dinners like half a tin of soup! I was shocked by how much some friends ate on sleepovers and would refuse food much to their parents confusion lol

@toomanyy yes, I was known as a caring babysitter always doing fun stuff with the children and cooking for them, and my mother tried to push me, but I plainly refused. Later, when I was married, the parents went to an antiques-fair and they dropped their two children and a little friend at my tiny appartment because "the children loved me so much", bye see you later. I gave the children candy and soda and let them read comics the whole time. That finally did it.

Do you know if Billy Connolly told this story about Jimmy Shand though?

This is a Billy Conolly joke about chic Murray. Jimmy Shand was a musician.

I agree it’s really sad, awful actually, but I feel for the friend as well - she must have been so embarrassed. And I very much doubt she was fed properly over a much longer term, living in that family.

nearly 20 years ago, I spent over £50 in Sainsbury's on ingredients and threw a joint birthday party for a couple of friends, spending 2 hours with another girl cooking several dishes, then the other girl helped me change my clothes into a party dress (helped me zip up the back) as I'd cooked in something more casual, anyway, the food was all gone in just a few minutes whilst she was helping me zip up my dress, I thought it was either horrible and they'd thrown it away quickly behind my back (my low self-esteem) or on a positive, they'd enjoyed it so much that they'd all scoffed the lot.
Anyway, I was happy that it had got eaten, even if we had 't got to eat any of it ourselves.
a few months later, my friends organised a birthday party for me, they bought oven pizzas etc, but then charged us all for the food 😅
On another occasion a friend and I were invited to a dinner where we'd get to try some ethnic dishes, and then after the dinner, asked us to pay for the food. We reluctantly did so as not to be rude, but were surprised as hadn't been told about it when invited 😅

On the leaving do: stealing the tip is despicable but, TBF, I’d expect the rest of the party to pay for the person who was leaving. Same if you go out for someone’s birthday etc.