To ask for your worst dinner party experiences?

[Smileandtheworldsmileswithyou]

I know there have been threads on this before, I just absolutely love them for some reason. These and the CF ones are the best! I'll start with mine. I had recently moved with my husband to a new country and my new boss invited me and a few other people from work to his house for dinner. When we arrived he was completely pissed, literally stumbling around drunk. He spent ages showing us a lizard on the wall which we all politely commented on, and waited and waited for the food...He then dropped a box of brownies all over the floor that another guest had brought as a gift and laughed about it for ages. Finally we were asked to sit down for dinner, but he said he couldn't carve the chicken so asked me to do it for him. He then came into the tiny kitchen to watch me try and carve it up and told me how I shouldn't worry, he would make sure I passed my probation at the end of the year. He then persuaded my husband to go in and finish off the job with the chicken before asking him if I was happy at work and if I liked him. We finally got to the table and he starts drinking my wine which I just ignore. He then tells everyone that he has made the bread rolls himself, even though I saw them in a packet in the kitchen. He told us a big elaborate tale about where he found the seeds for them. Dessert was finally served at around 1am, by which time everyone was desperate to get the hell out of there. He said we should take it in turns to host, funnily enough no one ever did take him up on that!

[RainbowSunset]

@Shade17

Unfortunately, yes. The internal temp needs to reach a certain level before its safe to eat - as I discovered after making myself quite ill envy (not envy)

Rubbish. It’s perfectly safe to eat raw.

Not 100% though, surely.

I did something wrong anyway, because I made myself and DH sick from a poorly cooked steak. May have been that I didn't sear all sides, may have been that I somehow cross contaminated the cooked meat, etc.

Comparing meals in the 2 day period before we got sick, steak was the only thing common to both of us that the rest of the family did not have.

I used to take a very relaxed attitude to cooking steak but I'm more careful now.

[Horehound]

Did you manage to eat the second dinner @OliviaWainright?

[inappropriateraspberry]

You've made me think about toasted tea cakes at Wimpy on a day out shopping with my mum! Showing my age I think 😬

[OliviaWainright]

LOL @campingfabulous Toasted tea cakes were a treat at Grannies!

[CampingFabulous]

Did you ever have a toasted tea cake @OliviaWainright ?

We got them if there were visitors 😉

[OliviaWainright]

I grew up very working class in a small working class town.

When I first moved to London, a new friend invited me round for supper. I had a full meal before going, because I thought supper would be a few snacks and a drink late at night. I'd always had a digestive and glass of milk for my supper!

[Exhausted4ever]

Well I've been out for lunch today, for a hot meal at 12.00 in a restaurant that does not serve cold food. Just putting that out there.

[GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER]

@ohforarainyday and @AnUnoriginalUsername, in this house a roast is almost always an evening meal, at 7 ish. We don’t even have Christmas dinner until around 5.
Even when I was a child and we invariably had a Sunday roast, it would be at around 6 - too much of the day taken up otherwise.

[Shade17]

Unfortunately, yes. The internal temp needs to reach a certain level before its safe to eat - as I discovered after making myself quite ill envy (not envy)

Rubbish. It’s perfectly safe to eat raw.

[SamusIsAGirl]

A strange and rambling one. Was at University in gaming society which often had some locals hang out with us since there weren't that many gaming groups around.
There was this strange older woman who was part of that group but wasn't a student but didn't play games though. She just hung around fag in hand, wanting to be the centre of attention from us younger folk and would often give us ornamental promises such as lifts to places (that never happened). She was also a bit stalkery but surprisingly other people didn't see it.

She dated one of my friends but swiftly moved onto someone else complete with gross public displays of affection (face-eating) and ignoring people's boundaries.

My friend was distraught but still enmeshed and she suggested and dinner party (?) to discuss this out. So I and my SO reluctantly went with her friend to her parent's house where she lived at the appointed date and time....to find a dark, empty house.

That's right no dinner, no-one at all. Next time they saw her she denied all knowledge of the thing she was discussing the previous week, yet was surprised when I kept avoiding her. Still, when she was trying to schmoose with me all I had to do was ask about the dinner party and she would shut up and leave.

[fairycakes1234]

ive a story i always laugh at. Years ago when i was 19 i went out with my new boyfriend for dinner. I ordered prawns, I thought they would be the baby prawns, but they showed up to my horror with tails, eyes, the usual things prawns have, there was 5 of them, I asked my boyfriend how do you eat them, he hadnt a clue, he was worse than me, instead of asking the waiter, i waited till he was gone, and put all the prawns in my handbag in a napkin, when waiter came back and im sure looking in amazement at my empty plate, I just told him they were delicious and thank you very much.......i often wonder what the waiter thought :)

[RainbowSunset]

@Shade17

Just the time I undercooked the steak. Had to put them back on the pan while everything else went cold

Is it possible to undercook steak?

Unfortunately, yes. The internal temp needs to reach a certain level before its safe to eat - as I discovered after making myself quite ill (not envy)

[Pennybubbly]

I live in Tokyo and a Japanese friend of mine was visiting from a different city and invited us to dinner at her sister's house. She then asked if we could invite some friends too, so we asked another UK/Japanese couple to join us.

We all set off for the sister's place..... which turned out to be 90 minutes and several train changes away, followed by a 30 minute walk from the station. We were pretty famished by the time we got there.

But great, dinner was on the table and it was make-your-own fajitas. Just the one per person. My (UK) friend and I are both veggies but fine, we'd pre-warned them. So we had a fajita with some smashed avocado and lettuce.

Friend's sis then moved onto her speciality - takoyaki (fried octopus balls). We delicately pointed out the vegetarian issue and was told "no worries, we'll do a veggie version!" So we got a small ball of fried batter with a bit of chopped ginger in it.

As we were leaving, we were told we'd need to "settle up on payment" and a calculator was whipped out and we were all asked to pay (the equivalent of) £40. I was mortified for my friend and tried to pay for her while simultaneously trying not to cry at the thought of paying £80 for 2 flour tortillas, a spoon of avocado, a lettuce leaf and 2 balls of batter. Happy Days.

[SamusIsAGirl]

Shameless bump but will post later

[LongTimeMammaBear]

My parents were visiting me from overseas. They have friends (pen palls o my DM and who visited them abroad a few times dying a very long friendship) who live in the midlands (I’m just south of London) and we were invited to their house for lunch, on a weekday. We accepted the invitation but told them I needed to be back o collect my DS after school so we agreed a date when he had an after school activity, meaning we had to be back by 4, leaving their home by 2pm. We arrived at 11:30 as they asked, so we could eat an early lunch so we could get back for my DS. We could smell delicious aromas wafting through from the kitchen when we arrived as well occasionally throughout our visit the wife would get up to go into the kitchen to check on the food. We had my youngest child with us (then about 1 yr old) and I’d learned from various past experiences to bring food for her when out, just in case. At 12:30, I had to ask if it were ok to feed my DD (as she started grumbling for food). No problem.

My parents hadn’t eaten breakfast as their friends had said they’d prepare a lovely lunch for us. 1:00 comes and goes, 1:30 passes, at 2:00 my parents’ stomachs could be heard grumbling and finally my parents said we had to leave as we had to go to ensure we were on time to collect my DS. Panicked looks on hosts’ faces as they said the food would be ready soon. Of course we made apologies but we had to leave. We were made to feel very bad as they’d gone through all this trouble.

My DM checked her emails when we got back and it was very clear about what day we were going to visit based upon my DS staying at school for after school club so we could go visit and return for DS to be collected for 4, that we’d have to leave by 2 hence they giving 11:30 arrival time.

In all the years since then, my parents have never arranged to visit these people again as I think the friendship fizzled out after that. The hosts really felt hard done by our leaving.

Thank goodness for motorway rest stops as got fast food on the way back.

[Grapewrath]

A friend recently invited us to lunch to meet her new partner. I was super excited as normally her food is amazing and generous. Anyway she had recently turned vegan as her bf is an eco warrior so I was excited to try the food.
We met her boyfriend who literally didn’t stop talking about how to save the world. Lunch was served which was raw broccoli, red onion, lettuce and some french dressing. It was served on side plates . There was no dessert and the drink was tap water. I had to leave as Dd was starving and I could tell was about to get very vocal about it.

[SmudgeButt]

DHs birthday dinner disaster at a restaurant a couple of years back....

MiL in her 90s has mobility issues so I checked that this branch of a popular chain had a wheel chair accessible table. No problem I was told! Got to the place to discover that the table was wc accessible but only after I had managed to get her up a dozen steps outside.

The restaurant was very busy (coupon night!) so we were warned dinner may take a while. Not a problem as they have a salad bar. So we ordered drinks and decided what we wanted. No problem with DH & MiL's choice but mine was sold out. No problem as there was other things on the menu I like so I picked an alternative. And off we went to get our salad.

After 45 minutes we enquired how long dinner might be. 15 minutes. Ok. After another 20 minutes we enquired again. Soon. Maybe 5 or 10 minutes. After another 20 ..... So nearly 2 hours after having given them our order the waiter came out, apologised again about the delay, so busy on coupon night and served MiL & DH. And then turned to me and said "sorry but we ran out of your choice after lunch today. Can I get you something else?"

There was nearly violence.

[HollaHolla]

First time I met ex-BF’s family.... we were young, and both still lived at home. I had been out for a fairly liquid lunch with colleagues (which he knew about), but said to meet about 5 in our town. Well, he took me to his family home, and failed to tell his mother I was veggie. She (mortified - lovely woman, actually) picked the ham off a pizza for me. I (still a bit squiffy) managed to try to hold a conversation, without staring at his dad’s APPALLING COMBOVER. It was one of those ‘don’t look at it, don’t look at it’ situations, where you can’t help but stare at it. I was NOT happy with the ex-BF. Still, we ended up together for about 7 years, and his parents always loved me, so can’t have disgraced myself too much.

[Schoolnoshow]

Not exactly a dinner party, but a child's party my DS was invited to. I didn't know the family and I'm not sure my DS really even knew the child well. Never-the-less, he was one of the few that had come. There were 4 children in the family, the mum, the mum's brother and probably 5 guests including DS.
We were slightly late as I tried to find their rather gorgeous, arts and crafts style house. The other parents had all dropped and run, but the mum asked if I'd like to stay with my DD. I made moves to go, but but she insisted it was fine, made me a cup of tea and chatted about her forthcoming wedding (it was literally a couple of days later) and legal stuff about her divorce. She REALLY wanted to talk.
The kids were all in a dark room, going mental, kicking the hell out of light up balloons, while she showed me her wedding dress.
She then finally got to the food part. Her and her brother bought out 2 pizzas for now what was 10 children and 3 adults. I didn't dare take any, because frankly, my ds could have eaten a whole pizza to himself. There was nothing else apart from a very tiny piece of chocolate cake for dessert
After the food, the mum suggested that the kids go and say 'hi' to Granny. Granny was bed bound, and after riding the stair lift, each of the children dutifully went to say hi. The rest of the party was spent with kids going up and down on the stair lift, wielding swords and balloons as weapons.
After the party, which was bizarre from my perspective, I asked DS what he thought of the party - 'BEST PARTY EVER!'
I look back on it and it as a fond, if strange memory, which stands out in a sea of samey kids parties.

[NigelWithTheBrie79]

It was awful. She refuses help though (despite being a psychologist herself) and always tells everyone else what fat pigs they are for eating a proper meal

My MIL is similar. She makes lovely food but will say to the females (never the males. They are allowed to stuff their faces without judgement) in the family something like "I've given you half a piece. We can't afford the calories at our age!" I would then request that the nearest male give me the other half of my.food.

[Crankley]

Mine is sad rather than worst. In my twenties (50+ years ago), I had a friend. We hitchhiked round Europe together, we lived in a shared house, I was her bridesmaid when she married a German bloke who she met while we were hitchhiking. I collected her from the airport when she called to say she had escaped from her husband who had mentally and physically abused her. He kicked her in the stomach when she was pregnant and she lost her baby. When I collected her from the airport she looked like a skeleton. She lived with me while I nursed her back to health. In time she left and after a while met a man who she eventually married.

I would occasionally be invited to dinner parties but was not dating at the time and it was eventually made clear to me that the effort of finding single men to even up numbers was becoming onerous. I declined the next invitation and never heard from her again.

[Sparticle]

@yogafairy did your DH stay at his colleague's house?!

[yogafairy]

@ILoveYoga we might have had the same friends! My husband and I were invited to dinner from my husbands work colleague. I said we'd get a babysitter but they said no and that it would be nice for their child to have company etc.

Anyway we get there and as the host leads us to the table it is only set out for four clearly adult spaces.

My daughters (4 &5) were unsure where to sit so I asked and they said that the children weren't eating and could wait in the kitchen with their child until we'd finished!

I got up and left with my children and stopped at McDonald's on the journey home.

Some people are just bizarre.

[EnidPrunehat]

For starters...

Back in the 70s, a friend who'd moved down here to do his postgrad teaching certificate always raved about his mother's magnificent 'Cheshire Teas'. Tables groaned with the home-grown, home-cooked goodness routinely served up and they were the epitome of lavish. So we were full of expectation when, while being up near his family home during the summer holidays, he positively begged us to visit and assured us that his mother would never forgive him if we didn't come and enjoy one of her splendid repasts. So, after a day out with our friend (who had warned us not to eat lunch since we had this teatime magnificence awaiting) we turned up at 4. Red flags should have been waved from the baleful stare his mother greeted us with. But no matter, friend was most jolly and ushered us into an immaculate sitting room where a small, highly polished and very 'leggy' little table was set with the full panoply of accessories - doilies, little napkins, sugar bowls with tongs, tiny little milk jugs etc. A very small plate of tiny little sandwiches (with flags in proclaiming their content) and an equally tiny plate of Eccles cakes sat like very small trophies amidst the 'niceties'. Mother, meanwhile, lurked in the kitchen. Friend invited us to sit down and started pouring tea (into equally minute china cups) and my ex (who really couldn't abide tea) politely asked if he might have a coffee perhaps. 'No, you can't!' came a shout from Mother. 'I don't make coffee at teatime. I'm not running a cafe, you know!'. We silently sat and chewed, very slowly, the microscopic offerings. I could have died for more tea and eventually, friend took the teapot back into into the kitchen from where we overheard 'Don't you dare let those people eat the Eccles cakes. Your dad and me want them for supper'. Awkwardness reigned for another half an hour when we literally made our excuses and left.

Years later, my ex and I can still get much amusement from this incident but for the life of me, we can't work out what was going on. Mother clearly hated guests and clearly didn't want them eating her daintily prepared nibbles. Friend seemed to assume that she'd suddenly turn hospitable if you traipsed a group of complete strangers through her house. She didn't.

[Deadringer]

We were invited to dh's cousin's new house for dinner. Looking forward to a nice evening but the atmosphere seemed a bit frosty. Cousin's wife sat at the far end of the room and barely spoke to us, then announced that she was going out. It was obvious that they had had a row before we came. It was clear that dinner was off the cards so we had one drink then left.