To ask about the worst ingredient substitution you've had the misfortune to taste?

[BackInBits]

I've come across a few.

My brother made a roast lamb and had no red currant jelly. Strawberry jam it was.

I've an aunt who put sour cream in the trifle. Not quite as bad as Rachel and the beef, but it did not work well.

I've an ex who was making chickpea patties that called for cumin, turmeric and coriander. In case you were wondering, oregano does not make up for a lack of cumin.

My late DM used to make buttercream with granulated sugar instead of icing sugar which was generally palatable if a bit gritty - until the day she picked up the salt in error.

I was making a Thai style dressing for salmon a year or so ago and I accidentally tipped the tablespoon of fish sauce into my glass of white wine instead of the glass with the dressing in it.
I hate wasting wine and tried really hard to drink it.

Indian restaurant in Caerphilly years ago. DH ordered a korma and they emptied a tin of fruit salad on top of it. Literally tinned fruit salad, there were grapes and everything.

@DilemmaDelilah

My ex (at the beginning when I hadn't realised he really had no idea how to cook) used mixed spice in the Bolognese sauce instead of mixed herbs. Not nice at all!

My brother has made fruit cake with mixed herbs instead of mixed spice before He thought he'd accidentally discovered a new taste sensation, 10/10 would try again. Me, a normal person, strongly disagreed.

I made a pasta sauce that needed red wine but I didn't have any so I used a splash of sherry instead. I thought it was fine, but my husband did not agree and is still very suspicious of alcohol-based pasta sauce today. ;-S

The worst one I have had (though it wasn't actually bad-tasting) was when I went to a catered meal as the only vegetarian. The menu was meat/veggie pie and veg, followed by apple pie. Unfortunately the kitchen had clearly made my single vegetable pie using the leftover apple pie pastry and it was laced with sugar....

Pimms with tonic water instead of lemonade. We were students, so not usually the most discerning, and this was a hotel. They remade it.

The ex, who kept me and two toddlers waiting for 3 hours while he showed off in the kitchen, had cooked the fish in loose tea. For 3 hours.

I asked dh to get some watercress as I was making salmon and wc fishcakes.
He bought cress. Salad cress.

He apparently didn't know there was more than 1 sort of cress.

DH used white wine vinegar instead of white wine in a risotto. It was very sour.

Similar to @aroundtheworldin80moves, as a student in the 90s we ordered a jug of "cold chocolate" in Cafe Rouge, which we had had before and was basically chocolate powder dissolved in milk. They made it with water. It was disgusting.

At a B&B in Suffolk our full English breakfast came with a sweet waffle with icing sugar on the top nestling next to the baked beans and sausage instead of a potato waffle.

Not sure if this fits this thread but ordered a toastie out the other day and it was cooked in burger fat not envy!! And I'm vegetarian! Tasted like an unwashed armpit, absoultly vile.

I put salt in a cake instead of sugar. Didn’t get why it was so disgusting for some time.

Green Thai curry made with ..... spam.

Not DP's finest culinary hour. Luckily I didn't have to eat it.

Harrisa instead of cinnamon on my porridge. That will teach me not to wear my glasses.

Oh - the margheritas made with

a) Roses Lime Cordial
b) White wine with "margarita mix"

Both were utterly horrible

Not quite in the spirit of the thread, but I can't let it pass without mentioning those roast parsnips disguised as chips at school dinners. 😖

Also sage and onion stuffing instead of sausagemeat in a 'sausage' roll. Scandalous.

Fish in loose tea instead of what @Burnshersmurfs? This is so puzzling!

Making scones aged 17. Recipe called for cream of tartare. I couldnt find any so used tartare sauce instead. 🤮

DS making fajitas at Uni, needed some spice and so tried cinnamon, a tablespoonful. He said it was kind of christmassy 🤣

Pizza base made with mooshed cauliflower

My ex-MIL once told me that she had been inspired by my quick lasagne with red sauce and white sauce. She made her lasagne with ketchup and salad cream.

Oh gosh this is by worst memory!

Back in a Welsh university for St David’s day a Welsh friend invited us round for genuine Welsh Cawl. What we hadn’t taken into account was that she was veggie, had used a veggie stock cube, had run out of vegetables and used a bag of frozen mixed veg (tiny pieces peas, sweetcorn and carrots ) and nothing else! It was dire, the bowls were huge and she kept topping us up!

Fortunately the lovely cleaning lady of our halls insisted we hadn’t had the real thing so wrote us list, we went shopping, she over saw us cook and we learned how to cook the real thing - thank God!

My mum once put pina colada mix into a thai curry... she thought it was coconut milk

Mmmm beef porridge, my fav!

After an argument, DH made the most fantastic looking cup brownie to make up. Completely inedible, I thought he was trying to poison me, he thought I was trying to start a fight again by slating his efforts until he tried it too. Mistook bicarb of soda for baking powder.

My daughter's boyfriend came to stay with us in the summer. He cooked a Bolognese but he added curry powder, garam masala and all sorts of other stuff to it (I have quite a big spice collection). Thankfully I don't eat meat so I didn't get to taste it, but it made my husband and son quite unwell...we now call it the pot of doom.

Carob for chocolate. My mum went through a "healthy eating" phase when I was growing up. Claimed it tasted just like chocolate. Not in this universe, it doesn't.