Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think my dinner party menu was better?

148 replies

TacticalWheelbarrow · 22/11/2012 16:55

A few weeks ago I invited a couple who have been friends with DH and I for years. Unfortunately the wife has been made redundant recently and they have been a bit stressed out. I offered to have them round for dinner and they seemed really up for it. So I for the evening I cooked:
Starter-homemade potato skins with bacon, cheese and mushrooms with a side salad.
Main- chicken fajitas with guacamole, sour cream, cheese and salsa (all in individual pots so everyone could help themselves) with nachos and jalapeños.
Dessert- homemade treacle tart (made by DH) and ice cream.

They picked at everything so I asked if it was ok and they turned round and said they had eaten a roast dinner before they had come. Shock

So they invited us round theirs for a dinner party and they served.
Starter- scallops which is fine yum. But it was one scallop with a purée thing, all very decorative but still one small scallop.
Main- a terracotta pot with layers of Aubergine, tomatoes, red onions and other veg in a creamy sauce with a small bit of salmon in soy sauce. Really nice but still really tiny portion.
Dessert- a chocolate mousse thing, lovely but served to us in a shot glass.
It was food that you get at one of them ridiculously expensive restaurants.
Now I had a good time and the food was nice but I was pissed off at the husband's comments. He said "it's amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it" and "we understand that you were pushed for time having two kids but your food was better than we expected." basically dropping hints about my food. He even made a dig about our wine when he brought out this expensive stuff and said "this may be a bit stronger for people who are used to echo falls". Hmm
It made me feel very uncomfortable.

Aibu to think well actually what I cooked was better than the cordon bleu (sp?) stuff they served?

OP posts:
Woozley · 22/11/2012 19:52

I thought the OP's menu is a bit unbalanced & heavy, too much cheese & cream, fat and carbs than I would like to eat, though I would not turn my nose up at any of it if someone cooked it all for me! I'd probably be struggling with the main course after the starter though and probably wouldn't manage much dessert, I'd feel a bit faint by then!

The other couples menu is better balanced and I would go for that but it's really, really bad to starve your guests with small portions. I would always go over than under, and let people help themselves rather than putting everything on the plate.

HullyEastergully · 22/11/2012 19:57

THIS CAN'T BE TRUE!

IvantaOuiOui · 22/11/2012 20:05

I mean NICE friends not mice friends.

MissBeehivingUnderTheMistletoe · 22/11/2012 20:11

Why do I keep getting an unbidden vision of Alison Steadman in Abigail's Party ? Grin

KenLeeeeeee · 22/11/2012 20:16

You need new, less pretentious and twatty friends. Like me! I bloody love fajitas and Echo Falls.

I do have a tendency to pronounce it "fadge eaters" though.

TheSkiingGardener · 22/11/2012 20:27

Now, I have served up similar menus to both of those, depending on my mood when planning the dinner party. And to the same groups of friends too.

It seems that, to your friends, dinner party means posh food, so your menu missed by miles. To you, dinner party means enjoying company with some grub.

The difference is that you were polite and they were very, very rude. Manners are about making other people feel comfortable, they failed miserably in this task.

ImperialBlether · 22/11/2012 20:46

Are you sure they weren't saying they had a spit roast just before they got there?

They sound incredibly rude. That would be the last meal they refused at my house!

strictlovingmum · 22/11/2012 20:50

I would have eaten your food even after the roast dinner, partly because I liked your menu and partly because I would not want to be rude to you and hurt you, that is what friends do.
Their menu sounds like staff you see in 2 Rosette restaurant DBB deal, looks good on paper, but in reality somehow disappointing.
Ditch the "friends" or at least cool down, hopefully they will modify their snobbish behaviour and if not, oh well....
And scollops are always served, rule (king or queen):
3 starter
5 main
so your friends are stingy as well.
I would happily come over to yours and help you with Echo Falls lolWink
Suggestion to them, less "Come Dine with Me" shit too.

SantaisBarredfromhavingStella · 22/11/2012 21:42

Fuck me, nothing worse than being on come dine with me & not even realising it Shock Anyway ignore the snotty twats, both meals sound lush but would've preffered yours as I can't fucking stand small portions-I mean really, what is the point in a 3 course meal that results in me calling to KFC or kebab shop on the way home Hmm

Jackstini · 22/11/2012 21:55

Ivanta - pmsl at mice friends!! they would have loved the cheese on the fajitas...

Tactical - I would have enjoyed your meal more as everything was home-made and help yourself is flexible on portion size.

I love scallops and salmon but the teeny portions your 'friends' served would have seemed very rude to me - as was their admission of having a full roast before they came to you! That was just realy cheeky.

On the Echo Falls - I'm not a wine snob but really not a fan of rose, especially with food - find it too sweet. Would have been perfectly happy with a £5 bottle of red or white though Grin

IceBergJam · 22/11/2012 22:15

Talk about food snobbery on this post.

Bet yours took longer to prepare OP. All they did was slice a few veg, bung a piece of fish in the oven and blitz a few things.

Homemade potato skins take forever! Or they do in our crappy oven.

GhostShip · 22/11/2012 22:49

OP ill come round and enjoy your fajitas and echo falls :o I love both!

Feck the snobs.

picnicbasketcase · 22/11/2012 22:53

Your menu sounds much nicer. They sound like snidey rude pricks.

tethersend · 22/11/2012 23:03

Their meal sounds better, but they sound like massive cunts.

Mintyy · 22/11/2012 23:14

Summed it up nicely there Tethers Wink.

I think we need say no more.

Slubberdegullion · 23/11/2012 08:05

OP are you still there?

Please give more details re the aubergine main in a terracotta pot. Like a flower pot?

Is this a new thing?

Sounds interesting. Do you have to stopper up the drainage hole? And what would stay in without shrinking in the oven? A circlet of spam?

A shot of chocolate mousse would have given me a a sad saaaaaaaad dinner party face.

GetorfsaMotherfuckingMorrisMan · 23/11/2012 08:16

I thnk I would sneer terribly at layers of veg served pretentiously in a terracotta pot. I mean how 2010. And how provincial.

I wouldn't want to eat potato skins and fajitas necessarily but the friend of yours sounds like a monumentally insecure wankstain. Nobody with any degree of manners would be so rude.

SlightlySuperiorPeasant · 23/11/2012 08:30

You need some nicer friends.

I have friends over for dinner, not 'dinner parties'. I don't live in Notting Hill or on a country estate.

wisden · 23/11/2012 08:31

Does anyone actually use the term "dinner party" anymore? It makes me think of my mum, with her 70s perm, wearing a pinny over her dinner party clothes and offering everyone sherry.
Both menus sound nice, but your friends behaviour make them sound like stuck up wankstain knobheads Grin therefore I would have preferred to eat yours.

Slubberdegullion · 23/11/2012 08:36

Of God. Terracotta pot vegetable layering is very 2010 is it? But this food receptacle trend hasn't even reached us yet. I am so behind the times. Must read Cheshire Life more, the food bit in the back, maybe there would have been pointers back in 2009.

Stupid boring parochial plates Sad

Longdistance · 23/11/2012 08:36

Your menu sounds great. Loads of food is the way to treat guests. You don't make friends with teeny tiny portions. Nor with cunty comments about wine choice, and then revealing they had a roast dinner.
They wouldn't get an invite ever again.
Rude, just rude.
Btw. Teeny tiny portions of food for pretentious idiots who think they're fancy crap should belong in a restaurant. Can't stand wanky people like that!

Slubberdegullion · 23/11/2012 08:38

wisden, I was at a dinner party last weekend. I knew it was a dinner party and not a kitchen supper because
a) we ate in the dining room
b) piano music played tastefully in the background
c) the ladies all wore statement beads

FirmlyInTheClosetAsImAMonster · 23/11/2012 08:39

I would agree with most posters, Your menu sounds delicious and completely preferable to theirs, but theirs was more dinner partyish. However I would love to come round to yours for dinner, it sounds scrumptious!

Slubberdegullion · 23/11/2012 08:39

Oh and
d) they got out the crystal, so we all had to drink carefully.

musicalendorphins · 23/11/2012 08:42

He was really rude. His comment and them eating before coming to your house for dinner. I dislike eggplant in creamy sauces, reminds me of mucous, and I really love enchilada's, so I personally would have enjoyed yours a lot more.