To be annoyed by awkward visitors & guests

[ali444]

I'm a single mum, work part time and don't have a lot of spare cash for luxuries or anything beyond the basics for my DC and myself. We live well but I'm very careful with money.
Dreading the end of lockdown as friends and family will be visiting more often and expecting to be fed (not a problem in itself, as long as they are happy to eat the kind of foods and ingredients I keep in the house).
I keep my food very plain and simple, no fancy ingredients or condiments etc. Don't like mayo (neither do DC so I don't even have it in the house). A friend came once and I made a simple but perfectly find cheese sandwich and she like "have you got any lettuce, cherry tomatoes and mayo to put on it".. No! Someone else asked me for "skimmed milk" (don't buy it, ever!), another one asked for "brown sugar" in their coffee (as opposed to standard white sugar), someone else has asked for "pink rock salt" once when helping me make a salad for a party... The list goes on.
AIBU to find it rude and inconsiderate to be in someone's house and, instead of just gracefully accepting what is offered, start asking for stupid, random and sometimes completely obscure things that they probably knew from the outset I was unlikely to have.
If I'm in somone's house, I never make a nuisance of myself but asking if they've got any this or that... it puts pressure on the host and I find it rude tbh. Anyone else feel the same?

OP, you must be delighted that your description of being a single mum, work part time and don't have a lot of spare cash

makes you Agonizing middle class. The most middle class to ever middle class for some posters.

The Upper Class would be the very last people to ask and expect anything when visiting someone, especially but not only when they know their host is not that comfortable financially.

It's the aspiring middle class who loudly guffaw at the lack of staples or what they think is the epiphany of good manners.

@Rukaya

your

😂

says it all.

I think it depends on the type of visit. Unexpected pop in, they are BU and of course you wouldn't have food or drink in that you yourself would not eat - they get what they are given. Planned visit, I do think it's nice to plan for what you know your guests like.
E.G SIL takes lacto free milk and we'll always make sure there is some in for when she visits even though she will eat cheese like it's going out of fashion

@LolaSmiles

I'd try and mentally put stuff like this in the 'it's okay for them to ask and it's okay for me to say I don't have it' category. Same here. If I know someone well enough to be going to their house then I know them well enough to ask if they have sugar/milk/salt/pepper/sauces. Same the other way round.

Yes same.

I suspect the melodrama being shown on this thread about terrible hosts is, like many things on MN, in no way reflective of real life. Most people probably do think "oh well I'll have a glass of water then".

@Rukaya

It's very weird to expect everyone to have everything you want when you arrive unannounced and uninvited

Who said anything about arriving unannounced or uninvited? Or for that matter, expecting everyone to have everything you want? No-one, that's who. Are you quite well?

Oh, you miss the point that we are replying to the OP, not discussing how to organise a diner party!

When the OP writes: visiting more often and expecting to be fed , did you think she meant the visitors were actually responding to a diner party invitation?

We are in a Mark Twain World on this forum sometimes

@yumscrumfatbum

This reminded me of my brother helping me put out food for a family gathering at my house once and asking me if I had any doillies! Who has those?

My mum is an avid doily collector she's only 61!

Astonished at those who think a friend asking if you have brown sugar is somehow insulting or demanding. Any friend of mine is welcome to ask if I have something - if I don’t there’d be no problem just saying so - really don’t understand any of this drama - it’s as if people are having people they already don’t like in their homes.

I fully get if I had a friend who could not afford anything other than the weekly food I wouldn’t go round at a meal time, or I’d
Bring food my self to share, and I wouldn’t make them feel I comfortable by asking for stuff if I knew their cupboards were bare or
100% allocated.

I had a mum over to my house for coffee once and she said ' This coffee is awful.' Funnily enough she was never invited back.

I read it as "I had MY mum over" and thought that was a bit harsh...

Some extremely strange posts here. Some people choosing not to have teabags in That's about proving some weird kind of point, rather than trying in any way to be a half-decent host.

@eatsleepread

It's really, really not anything to do with 'proving a point'. It's because I don't drink tea and rarely have guests. Not every choice is a hidden agenda, maybe that's your standards but it isn't mine.

Did you expect to be making your guest a sandwich? If so, I would always make a bit more of an effort. If not, I don't think there's any fault either way, you're not in the wrong for not having Mayo or salad, nor is your guest for asking! If I was cooking in a friends house I would ask for sea salt/ rock salt, as I know most of them would have it. But I wouldn't bat an eyelid if they did any!

I suspect the melodrama being shown on this thread about terrible hosts is, like many things on MN, in no way reflective of real life. Most people probably do think "oh well I'll have a glass of water then"
I think you're probably right.
It's gone from the OP being a bit irritated that someone who stops by unexpectedly asked for different sandwich fillings and brown sugar to pages of posters scrambling to prove how their own version of good manners is positively more impeccable than anyone else's.

Only on Mumsnet would you get people arguing whether it's more polite to only ask for tap water when a host offers you a drink or to keep a vast array of hot beverages available for any unexpected visitors.

I suspect most of us manage to visit out friends and when asked if we want a cuppa we say "yes, tea please" or "have you got any sugar in?" without half the drama that some posters seem to create.

If no one was buying loose tea, there wouldn't be any on sale

I don't think asking for mayo/lettuce/tomato/brown sugar is rude, per se. (Pink rock salt, a bit of a stretch!) Rude would be, on being told 'no, I'm afraid not', to then express surprise, dissatisfaction or annoyance. ^^

😂

says it all

Says the person who wrote “epiphany of good manners”

epitome

Don't know what the ^^ are doing. I didn't put them there!

I'm willing to bet that these people wouldn't go out of their way for others in general. I mean, really, what adults don't keep teabags in case someone comes round?! It's so bloody miserable.

I often go out of my way thank you. I've been looking after my single mum friend's DD all week while she has to work and her exH let her down. I've been dealing with an issue on behalf of a friend who's rented property I manage that has involved police liaison. I volunteer at a support group for women who suffered CSE (in non COVID times).

But hey, I don't get teabags in and apparently that's what people judge my kindness for fucking weird or what. How do you see in such black and white terms?

Why would I have something in I never drink? You know drinking tea isn't a universal British thing, it's not a requirement and many people don't? Why does it have to be tea? Explain please. Why not have Tuc biscuits in too on the assumption most people might want them. I hope YOU have Tuc biscuits in because I like them and otherwise I shall declare you a Bad Host and also an inhospitable person.

So much "this is what I like therefore everyone else even people I don't know should accommodate" a real meeeeeee attitude really

But FWIW I wouldn't be offended if someone asked for a sandwich/cup of tea/coffee/glass of squash. But I don't like it when they get pissy because I don't keep those things in

@HunkyPunk

I don't think asking for mayo/lettuce/tomato/brown sugar is rude, per se. (Pink rock salt, a bit of a stretch!) Rude would be, on being told 'no, I'm afraid not', to then express surprise, dissatisfaction or annoyance. ^^

I think it is rude.

If you arrive unannounced, and you know your friend is far from well off, first you wouldn't turn up empty handed anyway.. but anyway, either your friend has not mayo/lettuce/tomato or she would have offered them to you.
Or worst, she is keeping them for diner and the kids because she has nothing else for later.

It's amazing that usual threads about food shopping pretend to be shocked/horrified at posters spending £200 or £300 a week and posters fall over themselves to explain how a reasonable family must not spend more than £15 a week for a family of 6,
but when a poster is not very well off, she gets abused for not spending more on her daily shop for unexpected guests!

KVIIIlyne
So ignoring all your but people have pods and nice coffee machines so don't survive on instant coffee, obviously people with loose tea won't have tea bags stuff, given the popularity of hot drinks in the UK, it's fairly reasonable that most households will have some mechanism and resources to make tea/coffee in some form.

@KVIIIlyne

OP, you must be delighted that your description of being a single mum, work part time and don't have a lot of spare cash

makes you Agonizing middle class. The most middle class to ever middle class for some posters.

The Upper Class would be the very last people to ask and expect anything when visiting someone, especially but not only when they know their host is not that comfortable financially.

It's the aspiring middle class who loudly guffaw at the lack of staples or what they think is the epiphany of good manners.

The snobbery and classism on this thread is fucking appalling.

Herbal tea: I’ve got dandelion or a spiced blend. So if someone said “do you have herbal tea” I’d offer those. But if they then asked for chamomile, having been offered what’s available, thats rude

Why is it rude to ask?

I can’t remember off hand what herbal teas currently lurk in my cupboard. There may well be a box of chamomile hiding at the back. It wouldn’t offend me if a guest asked. Nor would I be embarrassed if I didn’t have it, I’d just offer an alternative.

Same with juice. We have juice (but not squash) so when friends with kids ask for squash I just say ‘hmm we don’t have squash but I could water down some juice?’

My childfree friends often have juice or cordial so it’s not a ‘kids’ thing. We keep long life juice in the cupboard too just in case.

I wouldn't be offended by anything, but just because it's easy for me to order coffees to be delivered by Starbucks or similar, Uber Eat and deliveroo are genius- I am not so ignorant that I would dismiss the idea that friends might not be in the same position.

Surely if you are that close to arrive to friends or family without warning, you would have an idea of their situation?

This thread reminds me of that scene in Motherland where Julia asks Liz if she has any herbal tea and Liza says "Ginger, fennel, green or mint?" And Julia says "Ooh I'll have a mint please" and Liz says "I was joking, I don't have any of those in" probably best for the more sensitive posters on this thread not to watch Motherland when they're so easily triggered by sloppy/middle class/epically miserable/insert other OTT word here hosting though

KVIIIlyne
Given the cost of tea/coffee is small (unless you choose to buy expensive tea, coffee pods for expensive machines, take out etc) unless I knew my friend didn't drink it and wouldn't have any in then it wouldn't cross my mind to avoid mentioning tea/coffee if asked if I'd like a drink.

Nobody knows the contents of my cupboards, but most people know what common items are. I remember when DH and I were dating and he asked if I had ketchup to go with his cheese on toast. It would be pushing it to get annoyed that he asked if I had a common condiments in.
One relative uses spread instead of butter, but we only keep butter in. They asked if I had spread one lunchtime. It wasn't rude and the answer was no.

It's hardly unreasonable to politely ask for fairly run of the mill things. The snobbishness comes if when told no the response is unreasonable/ I can't believe you don't have/judgey.