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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Cake-gate

529 replies

8Wina4 · 23/04/2019 23:59

I work in an office environment, in a team of around 20. Before the Easter weekend, I was chatting in the staff room on a break about how I've recently really got into baking, and one of my colleagues jokingly said that she wouldn't mind if I bought some cake to work for her to try. I promised I'd bring some home made cakes in after Easter.

Fast forward to today. I take in four different homemade cakes. I also took in some little vegan cake bites from Tesco, as we have 2 vegans in the office and I wanted them to be able to eat something nice too (everything I baked had flour/eggs in)

One of the vegans approached me at lunch, and told me that she was really disappointed that I hadn't made the effort to home bake anything vegan, and that I had promised homemade cakes, so I should have provided that for everyone. She said she didn't like the vegan cakes I'd bought from Tesco, and that she was fed up with being left out of team lunches/treats.

I was a bit taken aback, so apologised. But the more I think about it, the more I think she was actually the unreasonable one...

Thoughts?

OP posts:
Humpy84 · 24/04/2019 02:11

You sound like a really lovely person. I can’t imagine being a working Mum with the time to bake for colleagues but you’ve gone above and beyond. Not only that but it takes time to shop, and you’ve made a special purchase for her.

Unlike your good self, this woman lacks breeding.

Buy her a cucumber instead and tell her to shove it up her bum.

Inniu · 24/04/2019 02:15

How very rude.

Egg free cakes invariably contain banana, to which I have an allergy. In the 8 years of my mother making egg free bananaful cakes to accommodate my nephew I have never once, and she is my mother so she does know, reminded her of my banana allergy

CallItLoneliness · 24/04/2019 02:15

Wow. That person is the kind of vegan that gives the rest of us veggies a bad name. I might have chosen not to eat anything I wasn't sure didn't have gelatine in it, but I wouldn't have quizzed you on the ingredients and I'd've told you they looked lovely!

DeRigueurMortis · 24/04/2019 02:15

Of course you were unreasonable.

I only like chocolate cake and you wouldn't have catered for me with your home baked cakes.

You are anti-chocolate and thoughtless with it - you didn't even bother to get us chocolaterians a proletariat Tesco cake (Waitrose may have been acceptable).

You pandered to the fruitarians - banana, lemon, apple and bloody jam in a Victoria sponge. No I don't care if was strawberry or raspberry - those bloody fruit lovers get all the good stuff.

Sod the vegans - you've bloody alienated all us Chocolaterians.

I'm fuming AngryAngryAngryAngry

p.s. the coffee cake contingent are coming for you shortly - they are really bloody annoyed 😠 and nasty without their coffee cake fix.

MidniteScribbler · 24/04/2019 02:17

But to make 4 different ones but none of them suitable for your two vegan colleagues does seem a little unkind. Homemade cakes and shop bought are not really comparable, are they?

Then feel free to bake your own (after you fuck off, of course).

StoppinBy · 24/04/2019 02:33

If you did want a vegan cake there is a cake called 'wacky chocolate cake', it bakes up ok BUT honestly I would not be altering my usual recipes to pacify this kind of person.

YANBU to not make a scratch vegan cake, she WBU to be so darn rude, unless you specifically said you would bring in a vegan cake then you actually went out of your way to accommodate her by buying in special stuff for her.

mrbob · 24/04/2019 02:49

I am vegan (mostly) I love cake and would be touched that you brought any vegan cakes in for me. Or even a pack of Oreos tbh. If I want home made vegan cakes I will bake them! She was rude

Margot33 · 24/04/2019 02:59

Sorry, she was rude.

Margot33 · 24/04/2019 03:01

Suggests she bakes one for the office!

MrsMozartMkII · 24/04/2019 03:03

Bloody rude CF!

Some excellent responses on here though Grin

1forAll74 · 24/04/2019 03:12

This person was very impolite and rude to you.Her veganism has gone to far,as surely she could have savoured a small taste of those lovely sounding cakes that you baked.There is always someone in the workplace,who has to be difficult at times.!

shiveringtimber · 24/04/2019 03:12

It's not a vegan thing but a CF thing. Ignore.

lunar1 · 24/04/2019 03:13

What a bitch!

DS1 has a horrible reaction to dairy. He's happy to politely decline, he'd be thrilled if someone brought him something from a shop as he is rarely able to join in.

I'll be honest, we'd both rather shop bought than home made unless we are sure the baker really understands dairy free. Bitter experience has proven it's not as easy as it sounds and he'd only realise after he's broken out in hives and has looks 20 months pregnant.

Unless you have to avoid a food, it can easily make its way into baking!

EleanorLavish · 24/04/2019 03:20

Could I have your recipe for French Apple Cake, please?
(Misses point of thread)

mathanxiety · 24/04/2019 03:41

Tell her next time she can provide cakes for the whole office and it will be your turn to whine at the quality and make up slights.

BritWifeinUSA · 24/04/2019 03:45

You were very kind to bake not one but 4 different cakes. I assume she is vegan by choice?

FishCanFly · 24/04/2019 04:16

What a silly moo

Ferii · 24/04/2019 04:29

YANBU. What an utter cow! I can't believe someone would have the cheek to say that! I'm a home baker and my old office had several vegetarians, two dairy-free, a soy-free and a garlic/onion free. It was a bloody nightmare. We'd all bring in bits and bobs from time to time and noone got offended if they couldn't eat it. You brought 4 homemade cakes and went out of your way to ensure the vegans had something too. I'd continue baking as usual, pile on all the cream you can find and make a small individual vegan desert for the one nice vegan in your office and make sure the bitch vegan gets nothing.

Sashkin · 24/04/2019 04:35

c75kp0r Grin

OP, don’t let the fact you have never cooked a vegan cake put you off! Bring all of your experiments in for CFCakeVegan to try. The more the better, I’d be aiming for a couple of rank over-oily cakes every day, just for her. I remember eating a particularly disgusting sugar-free lemon and olive oil effort from our local farmers market last summer (tasted almost entirely of olive oil). Google that, and maybe substitute grapefruit or something else weird and non-cakey for the lemon.

randomsabreuse · 24/04/2019 04:35

Vegan cakes are quite fiddly to get right, half the recipes are totally inedible (kids' allergies meant I needed to find an egg free recipe to avoid toddler strops and now my own strops as well, thank you dc2). I have now found a recipe that works (all recipes egg free banana bread subbing in vegan spread and adding cocoa to the flour) and have not tried any more options since I found something I liked!

Vegan spread isn't always easy to find. I tend to need to visit big shops for things...

floribunda18 · 24/04/2019 04:37

What ferii said. I'd make sure she is specifically left out next time.

floribunda18 · 24/04/2019 04:39

If you make her a lovely vegan banana bread, she'd probably say I DON'T LIKE BANANAS or something anyway. She sounds like a toddler.

ittakes2 · 24/04/2019 04:47

I have coeliac's disease so I can't eat gluten and it would never cross my mind to even think someone would provide for me in this situation - I think you were being very kind going to the shop and buying them something. Vegan is a choice - she's a nutter and I agree with others - ignore her. 4 cakes and a trip to the shop for vegan options...you sound very kind and thoughtful to me.

amandacarnet · 24/04/2019 05:16

Just don't make anymore cakes. If anyone asks after them, just say you can do without the hassle for not bringing in cakes that all colleagues wanted.

RhiWrites · 24/04/2019 05:40

She was rude and graceless. But it’s not that hard to make vegan cake, I’ve done it. Banana bread would have been a good choice since banana is an egg substitute. You can also substitute with chickpea starch (saved from rehydrating chickpeas).