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Original poster

Unappealing meals that you have made

77 replies

Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 18:33

I'd say my cooking skills are variable. I can turn out decent food but occasionally make a totally dud meal.
Today's was broccoli and potato soup, inspired by the need to use up some lingering broccoli.
Well it was watery and uninteresting, has made the house stink of brassica and nobody finished their bowl, even though I seasoned it well and used good stock and added some parmesan on top. Just boring dishwater.
Make me feel better please, what have been your duds lately?

OP posts:
Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:18

Mydahliasareshit · 15/09/2025 19:41

Stuck in the middle of nowhere in Scotland, we spotted a small country stores with a big freezer full of venison. Lovely, we thought, defrost on the way, then roast a haunch of venison in red wine tonight when we get to our cottage.
One hour, two hours, three hours, we basted, prodded and turned. Knife couldn't even get through it. Had egg beans and toast.

How disappointing, and expensive no doubt

OP posts:
Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:18

greglet · 15/09/2025 20:17

During covid, we ordered takeaway fish and chips. Had loads of chips left after we’d finished. DH was on a soup-making kick so we had leek and potato soup made with leftover chippy chips.

It was not nice.

Haha. I admire his frugality

OP posts:
Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:20

JustStopItNorasaurus · 15/09/2025 19:34

@Ksibeij I have tried all my life (now aged 52) to like soup and I just can't.

I love broccoli but broccoli soup is a nonstarter.

Anyway- I once poached us two fillets of salmon that must have been on the turn. Both DH and I were so so so ill for a day.

We finally, shakily made it down the stairs and I got us some peppermint tea. We were pale, sweaty and in our bathrobes. When I handed the tea to DH (we sort of matched it in shades of green) DH looked at me and said 'would you marry me?'.

Since then I have made many a halfway decent meal- but I still love the memory of the time I gave us food poisoning.

That's very romantic, how sweet

OP posts:

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General food
Awdangit · 15/09/2025 20:22

I didn't make it, but I just had the most disgusting takeaway Chinese. Most went in the bin and now I'm eating cereal and trying to decide if I've got food poisoning.

Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:23

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 15/09/2025 19:17

I once made turkey meatballs in a rich tomato sauce - I thought they would be healthier than beef or sausage meatballs. I made a double batch - 10 adult portions - to feed dh and me, and our three bottomless pit teenage sons, with a second meal for us all to go in the freezer.

The tomato sauce was good - cooked for ages so it was simmered down and rich - but the turkey meatballs were so rank they were inedible. Dry, flavourless (despite plenty of seasoning and herbs etc), and none of us could stomach them. I ended up throwing it all away - both lots - and we had fish and chips.

I've had the exact same experience using turkey mince for meatballs. Even with tons of extra flavouring they wear awful

OP posts:
EarringsandLipstick · 15/09/2025 20:23

Love this thread! I made a ‘healthy’ smoothie I’d seen on Instagram. Lots - and lots - of spinach, but also tumeric & ginger, and then some fruit / berries. Yes, it looked vivid green but I reckoned the ginger & fruit would still make it palatable to the kids (teens). They were reviled by it.
I forced myself to drink it, unwilling to let them know I secretly agreed, it tasted primarily of spinach, for sure, but the tumeric was also pervasive. It was awful.

PermanentTemporary · 15/09/2025 20:24

Grin at ‘quick but grim’

I can cook quite well if I follow a recipe. If I don’t it’s a toss-up. I decided to make nettle soup once. It looked like the diarrhoea of Beelzebub and tasted like it too.

EarringsandLipstick · 15/09/2025 20:24

PermanentTemporary · 15/09/2025 20:24

Grin at ‘quick but grim’

I can cook quite well if I follow a recipe. If I don’t it’s a toss-up. I decided to make nettle soup once. It looked like the diarrhoea of Beelzebub and tasted like it too.

Hahaha! Brilliant!

EarringsandLipstick · 15/09/2025 20:26

Another recent fail, not really because of taste, but the awful lingering smell, was oven baked cod with potatoes chunks & red onion. Throw it all together, into oven. It tasted fine, nothing amazing, but it looked so awful & the SMELL, something about the fish / onion combo, it lingered for a week, even tho it was still summer & warm & windows opened.

pictoosh · 15/09/2025 20:28

I recently tried the 'tuna salad' meal prep that's doing the rounds on TikTok for my work lunches.
Produced a greyish brown slop that looked like it had been digested already.

Coffeeishot · 15/09/2025 20:29

Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:17

Yeah cream would have improved it. Milk would have made it even more thin. I did blitz it.
Deffo needed cream. Or binning.

Show quote history

Probably binning 😀oh well now you know not to make it again .

Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:32

Coffeeishot · 15/09/2025 20:29

Probably binning 😀oh well now you know not to make it again .

Show quote history

I've got a portion saved for my lunch tomorrow 😞, not sure I can face it

OP posts:
HangingOver · 15/09/2025 20:32

DP made a curry and used condensed milk instead of coconut milk.

Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 20:33

HangingOver · 15/09/2025 20:32

DP made a curry and used condensed milk instead of coconut milk.

The sweetened condensed milk type? Oh dear

OP posts:
Dox9 · 15/09/2025 20:45

Creamed leeks that ended up like a pot of snot.
Taste and smell was OK but of God the gloopy texture.

Powerof321 · 15/09/2025 20:51

Basically Anything i’ve ever made in the slow cooker (no longer own one) my worst one ever being “honey seasame chicken” i can’t remember what it tasted off just that it was bad and over 10 years later my daughter still casts up the fact it was so bad i binned it and we had to have beans on toast! My husband eats most things (some quite questionable) and he managed about 2 bites.
it was so bad the dog turned his nose up at it. I followed a recipe which lots of positive reviews exactly so i’m not sure what went wrong but that was the end of my brief dalliance with slow cookers!

SanFranBear · 15/09/2025 20:51

Made aubergine 'meat'balls once, probably about 9 years ago... the DC still talk about them as the worst thing they have ever eaten - and we have 'Try Something New Night' every week!

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 15/09/2025 20:54

I once made something with tuna and lots of cabbage. With some sort of horrible cheese sauce.

It was nicknamed sewage pie.

Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 21:00

Dox9 · 15/09/2025 20:45

Creamed leeks that ended up like a pot of snot.
Taste and smell was OK but of God the gloopy texture.

Might just have needed loosening with a bit of milk

OP posts:
Original poster
Ksibeij · 15/09/2025 21:03

A meal that sticks in my memory for the wrong reasons is the Thai pineapple egg fried rice dish I attempted. All the separate components made me think it would be delicious, and I love Thai food. But it was utterly rank. Pineapple has no place with eggs and the fish sauce fought with all the other flavours. It was very bad.

OP posts:
TheTempest · 15/09/2025 21:07

I made a tagine when now DH had been together about 6 months. Bought a tagine dish, all the ingredients and spent several hours making it. It was absolutely grim, even the dog wouldn’t eat it. Have never made tagine again and it’s still talked about in the family 🤣

ozarina · 15/09/2025 21:08

HangingOver · 15/09/2025 20:32

DP made a curry and used condensed milk instead of coconut milk.

😂😂😂

intergalacticplanetary · 15/09/2025 21:10

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 15/09/2025 20:54

I once made something with tuna and lots of cabbage. With some sort of horrible cheese sauce.

It was nicknamed sewage pie.

Sewage pie 🤣

oatmilkthesecond · 15/09/2025 21:19

I once stayed up til 1am making a ‘cake’ that I ended up having to cut with a bread knife. Baking always goes wrong. I’m not precise enough. Thought I’d be on safe ground recently with a dairy free fish pie. Over cooked, under seasoned, sad leftover mash not quite crisped up and too lumpy, large clumps of boiled egg and - horribly - coconut milk. My husband and son politely ate it but agreed with my scathing assessment.

oatmilkthesecond · 15/09/2025 21:20

intergalacticplanetary · 15/09/2025 21:10

Sewage pie 🤣

Show quote history

Actually laughed out loud for a while at sewage pie