Travelled to friend's house for dinner, just strawberries for desert - AIBU to think it's low effort?

[Carefreebie]

On the weekend my partner and I travelled to a friend's house for dinner. The journey was over an hour by train.

The main course was sausages with nice sides (potato salad, tomato salad, another salad). That was nice.

But desert was just strawberries with some pouring cream.

We had a nice time, but AIBU to feel that the desert was very low effort and unexciting, and should have been more exciting than strawberries given the journey?

When my friend came to mine, I did a 3-course meal, feeling I should make a big effort because of her long journey.

@InsomniacA

they can be, all that dancing in the bowl! 🤣🤣

(I too have an iPhone that thinks lovely should always be lively)

Fresh English strawberries are in season at the moment and are gorgeous with cream.

I don't buy or eat the tasteless foreign imports so those would have been a real treat for me.

Haven't you been to m&S or Waitrose recently....😂these "processed desserts" are often absolutely delicious and v good quality. Not far off restaurant standard. It's not the 1970s with cheap artic roll you know!

Still it seems the upf mob are out in force today!

look I’m going to give you some serious advice here. If you want a fancy meal out, book a restaurant and pay for what you eat. One hour on a train? You didn’t scale Everest to go for dinner catch a grip.

I have an extremely busy life with kids, work, parents, family and friends. I used to go ALL out for meals. I mean fine dining food. Did I enjoy the experience? No I was stressed, exhausted and spent a small fortune. I wasn’t present with the company we had round because I was run ragged trying to “impress”. I have massively loosened the reins and had a word with myself. My family don’t deserve to have a snappy Mum because I want to impress people. That’s a massive me problem. So yesterday we had friends round for a BBQ in the sun a couple of years ago it would have taken me hours prepping everything. This time it was burgers, sausages and bbq salmon. A bought tub of potato salad, coleslaw and some cut up tomatoes, lettuce and cheese. Job done. They got a free dinner and I was actually present with my friend and we had a great long chat. The days / time spent with friends is an investment of my time and I would be annoyed if what my friends were actually coming over for was fine cuisine and not my company and fun.

You have three distinct issues here.

1. you are treating the meal as transactional “I cooked X standard of meal so that’s what I want back. True friends are not transactional and don’t treat time together as such
2. you are equating how much you thinks she values you by the amount of money and time she spent cooking for you. Bollocks and again transactional
3. you are taking zero stock of what other pressures she had going on all week and that maybe she wanted to be relaxed and stressed prepping food
4. SEXIST much? You don’t mention HIS lack of effort, just hers.

also FYI two packets of strawberries and cream will have cost close to £10. You can buy a triffel for £5 in Tesco. I would argue it was a very thoughtful dessert when strawberries are actually in season, delicious and there was the weather for it. Personally I wouldn’t even eat dessert ever as I don’t like it and don’t see the point after a carbs filling meal so strawberries would be my perfect dessert

you need to catch a grip and seriously reevaluate your expectations of other people and if the only thing you are taking from time spent with friends is your scorn and judgement on what they serve for dinner then do THEM a favour and cut them loose. I would not want to be friends with someone as judgemental as you

My friend and I normally cook each other lasagne or similar and then vienetta ! Please don’t visit me 😀

Totally agree with this. The better the ingredients, the less you have to do with them!

Also, who tallies up the amount of effort compared with effort of travel, reducing eating dinner with friends to a transactional exchange?

Your hosts might be tired, slightly unwell, stressed at work, wrangling dc in to bed. If you are a true friend, you give them the benefit of the doubt, and surely you don’t necessarily want them to go to loads of effort on your behalf anyway? It’s better that they are not stressed and have energy enough to enjoy a good conversation.

Some people find hosting more stressful than others and if hosts want to take it easy; why shouldn’t they? Not every shared meal needs to be complicated. I’d rather see my friends more often than eat a three course dinner with them infrequently.

The last time I travelled over an hour to see my dear friend, not only did she not feed me a fancy 3 course meal, but she didn't even break out the "good biscuits". 😅

But no good for OPs purposes as definitely still qualify as "low effort"

My honest opinion is that you are being completely unreasonable @Carefreebie .

Please don’t blame other women for the OPs gross entitlement.

Wow, are you normally this judgy of "friends"?

It sounds like a lovely meal. And strawberries are at peak loveliness this time of year!

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Anyone who served me vienetta would have a loyal friend for life.

Oh Lord, I think you have been spending too much time on TripAdvisor.
Surely no one rates their friends.

I go to restaurants for the food and to other people´s houses for the company. We are having watermelon and melon for dessert on Saturday. We all decided it is the best option at 40 degrees. I don´t understand your post at all.

@anothervoice

Give over. It's dinner with friends, it's hot (here anyway) & it's a perfect meal, doesn't need to involve a complicated & hours spent in the kitchen.

Its not about gourmet food it's about (or should be) seeing friends.

& there's absolutely no need for your snarky comment about camping, trying to make you sound witty, it didn't. It was just mean.

But it’s not a restaurant, it’s a casual dinner at home with friends.

This. In short YABU 🙄🤨

Haha, we had friends round at the weekend, gave them burnt home made pizza and salad stuff and a a bowl of strawberries. Had a brilliant time and are all looking forward to doing it again. But then we like our friends and they like us so maybe thats the difference.

I still don’t understand how buying a processed, sugary dessert from the shop is ‘high effort’ compared with strawberries and cream.

@itsalwaysthesame

it to me it's not. I have vegetarian sausages & salad a lot as a low carbing vegetarian. Love my air fryer!!

I don't know what it is but I get excited for eating stuff at other people's houses that I am really not bothered about at home.

I’d have been perfectly happy with the strawberries and cream. Used to be a treat when I was younger!
I think be grateful they made food at all. I’m sure you can find a MN thread about travelling to see a friend and not being offered anything, if you look hard enough.

Firstly, I think its extremely rude to complain about a hosts efforts. While I personally don't like strawberries (alas, since covid they tast horrible) I think it is an ok dessert. Not to my taste but lots of people love strawberries.

Personally I always offer a choice. 2 or 3 types of fruit and something unhealthy and sweet. Usually homemade because I like to bake but of course its fine to buy, Nothing fancy. Brownies or choc chip cookies or coffee traybake. I usually make a big batch and freeze. Maybe (especially if kids) some bought ice cream to go with that.

Your journey has nothign to do with it, if you travelled the extra 15 minutes should it be a tower of profiteroles?