What food do you avoid ordering when out of the home, because you make better at home?

[IzzyGone]

What do you not order when you go out to eat as you know you'll make a better version yourself and therefore pick something else?

Mine is banana loaf, nothing flash but mine is better than coffee shop version.

Chili con carne and lasagne

Would rarely order soup or steak.

And if I'm out for brunch I'll always have eggs benedict as I can't be bothered with the faff of hollandaise at home.

Another one for roast dinner, love the social aspect of Sunday lunch but apart from a really fancy one we’ve had nothing is ever as good!

Chilli con carne and most chicken dishes, because we eat a lot of it at home.

I do order quiche, lasagna and moussaka, because although mine taste great, I can’t be bothered often to make dishes with lots of stages.

Yeah I would never order bolognese or bacon sandwich I am so fussy and mine are chefs kiss for me anyway!

I love ordering fajitas as although I make them at home I don’t do all the trimmings or serve them sizzling, so that’s usually a treat

we also don’t tend to make Thai food at home so a really good nasi goreng or green curry is a must order when out

I am not sure I make any of this “better” exactly but I make it more to my exact taste/texture preferences! So basically I like it more 🤣:

macaroni cheese, spaghetti bolognese, and many other pasta dishes.
Depending on the restaurant - pad Thai and Thai green curry.

Certain breakfast/brunch stuff -
English breakfasts, toast, oats, eggs, smoothies.

Desserts - banana bread, chocolate chip cookies, orange and lemon loafs.

This is exactly my thinking! Though it’s hit and miss for me as there is far too much variety about the bread and meat used and the sharpness of the sauce.

Had one the other day with brioche, Serrano, and super sharp hollandaise. It made me sad

Roast dinner - nothing compares to the home cooked version.

Also lemon drizzle cake !

It’s not about whether the place serves bad food. I make better roast potatoes than you’d get at a Michelin starred restaurant, because roast potatoes are something much better suited to home cooking than restaurant cooking (where they can’t be cooked to order but still need careful timing).

Other things in this category- pies. Restaurants can only do them when they put a warning on the menu that you’ll have a long wait or ask you to pre-order. Otherwise you’re just getting stew with a lid on it, which is not a pie. Large soufflés have the same problem and you usually have a long wait.

I think some people are missing the point of the thread. It’s not about never eating out. The OP is asking what specific foods you don’t order when you go out to eat because you prefer your version to the restaurants.

Personally, I like cooking but wasn’t able to do much for a while for various reasons and I also live alone. So I used to eat out almost daily - but there were still some menu items I could make better at home so would typically avoid.

I don't order: Roast dinner, pasta dishes, hot curry or croissants.

I do order things that are deep fried - so chicken balls, bhajis, battered fish because I don't have a deep fryer to make them

Same…I’m always disappointed when I’m eating a roast dinner ‘out’. The only slight positive being…no washing up I guess 😂

Most European food I prefer to cook at home, I tend to eat East Asian food out, I have no clue how to make it and it is so delicious!

I’ll always order fish and chips because I can’t cook that easily at home. I’d never order pasta because that’s too cheap and easy to do myself.

I never get anything with pasta & sauce when eating out for that reason - but love a proper chewy pizza done in a real woodfired oven.

I love proper fish and chips because nothing I can do at home compares - apart from anything else I don’t have a deep fat fryer.

so the things I really enjoy out, so inevitably choose, are definitely the things I’m not able to replicate at home.

lol - snap

For me most of the time it’s cake. I’m a good baker and bake a lot - if we are at a local coffee shop for example we’ll always get a coffee but I will never buy eg a brownie, school cake or rocky road for example because I prefer my own.

Risotto! I may be biased, but I think mine is better.

I will order it but I’m generally disappointed with chicken parmigiana. I make a much better one at home. It is a faff though.

I often order something mushroomy, I'm the only one in my house who likes mushrooms so rarely get to eat anything that's very mushroomy because if one of us is cooking it's for everyone.
I do sometimes have a lazy dinner when DH is out late of pasta with sauteed mushrooms with garlic and truffle pesto

Steak and kidney pie. Mine is very good, I've learnt from experience that anyone else's will just disappoint me.

Soup, because I have homemade soup for lunch every day and if I'm going out to eat then I want something completely different.

It used to be cake. Any cake really. It just wasn’t worth the disappointment. But I hardly do any baking now as I realised the rest of the family were much more disciplined than me and it wasn’t great for 3/4 of every baking session to attach itself to my thighs so now I’ll often have a cake out, just not a type slathered in icing.
Roasts. Sometimes a good array of veg but the potatoes are always a disappointment and the gravy is sometimes suspect.

Tbh I make most traditional English things better than most cafes or restaurants (or perhaps I should be less boastful and say more to my personal taste) though I am still happy to eat nearly everything out, as having it cooked for you and served and cleared away in good surroundings is all a treat. Except roast beef, apart from a couple of places that I trust to source decent quality, I’ve given up ordering this when out. And of course I don’t only go to English places, I love Indian, Italian, French, just been to Portugal, love sushi, and I’m pretty hopeless at / have never even tried cooking most non traditional English dishes.

Pizza- pizza from a takeaway is awful. My curry is often better than a takeaway also.

Another vote for lasagne & pasta. It never tastes as nice as my own. Pizza & desert is probably the only thing I like more when it comes to eating out.