She turned her nose up at my joint camping meal, then added her own stuff!

[MerchantGourmetLover]

On our camping trip with friends we decided that each night one family cooks a meal to feed everyone. I got allocated the final night, so a bit more difficult in terms of bringing fresh stuff from home as it won't last.

My friend got allocated the first night and presented a home cooked chilli using all these organic ingredients picked from a local allotment. She also made some pointed comments about how she is trying to reduce her consumption of ultra processed foods.

To make life easier, for my meal (which to be fair was similar to hers) I used some packets of Merchant Gourmet cajun beans and Mexican grains - which I happen to think are really nice. As soon as I mentioned this she started quietly grumbling about UPFs and I overheard her describe it to someone else as "slop from packets". I tried to ignore and rise above it, but at the moment I served up my meal to everyone, she popped up with a load of extra stuff (of course from the organic allotment) which she claimed was "just some sides to add to your meal", but she then proceeded to only eat her stuff and ignored everything I had cooked.

She has form for this as something similar happened last year! Should I have tried harder with my offering or AIBU to be upset that she was rude about my meal in front of everyone else?

Indeed - just another indicator she's a twat. As Defra puts it:

"You can only label food as ‘organic’, or use terms relating to organic production methods, if the product, its labels and any suppliers are certified by an approved UK organic control body."

I grow veg - and eat Merchant Gourmet! Tomato puy lentils 🤤 lovely with courgette and feta - however you obtain that courgette!

I feel sad for you because she spoiled your nice meal with her negativity. Next time you ask her to cook for herself and you ánd the other campers do you/themselves. It's perfectly fine to adapt to the situation and serve a mix of freshly-picked environmentally responsible food and some ingredients more practical while camping.

She’s a dick

You should just hand out pot noodles next time 🤣

Oh, I remember this series, especially this episode.

Thanks for reawakening my memories. 💐

camping food is 3 minute noodles. Or beans and sausages if you're being posh. Your food was more than enough!

Why do women do this? I’ve experienced similar. Complete mystery to me. Holidays are so personal yet so precious in these times, why would you go with others who have different values and will make you miserable?

Dahling... doesn't she know it's SO last year to cook quinoa and freekeh from scratch when Merchant Gourmet do all the hassle for you?

Pre-cooked grains are not the same as UPF in my opinion. You were on a camping trip. I'd have been opening tins of beans with sausages in 😂.

I once organised my kid's birthday party for five guests and my kid. So we had six of everything. One Mum turns up and insists we should include a younger sibling of the opposite gender (relevant as they were even less interested than they might have been) and that her child can't eat anything because they're strict Muslims and there's ham, sausages and Jelly contaminating the food...

Now I'd seem both her kids at school happily tucking in to the non-Halal plates at parties and eating ham and sausages. But it was with great delight that I pointed out that the meat was separated from everything else (Vegetarian child), there was in fact no pork in anything (as I'd been expecting a Muslim child to attend) and even the jelly was Vegetarian and Halal... As were the Haribo...

I've never seen anyone look so disappointed... Some people just like to feel superior. I bet yours tasted nicer too!

Slop from packets? What a rude twat.

I think my favourite was the middle-class family who went to Paris every year, who were paired with a working-class family who went to Disneyland Paris every year. They both loved each other's holidays. MC Dad was really snooty at first and ended up going on all the rides twice. WC Mum was worried about French food and loved it. I think they may have concluded with plans to do the same thing together the next year under their own steam. Nothing like the conflict that the show's producers presumably hoped for, but it was lovely.

Another corker was the most-Essex-family-ever, whose ideal holiday was 7 nights all-inclusive in Cancun with tequila slammers for breakfast, paired with a Christian couple with kids whose ideal holiday was helping build a library in Ghana. The latter turned out to be a bit weird. The library was named after them and they were carried shoulder-high into it --- until I saw this programme I didn't know what "white saviour complex" meant. They had 3 kids, one of whom never appeared on camera, and they all clearly hated every minute. By the end I was rooting for Team Tequila.

Your food sounds lovely! Ditch her! She’s no friend

She sounds like a pain in the arse. You should have given her pot noddles for her meal. She might have enjoy it 😉

The minute I'd heard her call my food slip would be the minute hers went in the bin/dog/dh. Cheeky fucking cow

None of those items are UPF in my view

Separate holidays- something from a packet or tin is not automatically UPF. the benefits of organic, despite lots of searching for over 40 years show no demonstrable difference nutritionally from supermarket product. Your friend sounds like an uninformed snob, as well as being very rude-I think you know what to do.

How astonishingly rude of her! How lacking in basic courtesy. Actually just plain nasty! Why do some people find such pleasure in being so horrible to people they call friends?
No more shared meals!
I hate the one-upmanship surrounding food. Necessary dietary requirements aside, it's just another form of snobbery.

Sorry to state the obvious, but your friend is a tit, with a capital T.
Next time make sure you go camping without her. She is not a true friend.

They sound really insecure and out of touch with reality. The reality is the chilli with all the fancy allotment veg was probably just alright and nothing fancy, but because the person who made it is a bitchy joy hoover so everyone was salivating and acting like it was the best thing they ever had in their life.

It's perfectly reasonable and acceptable to have food made with food from packets at home at on your camping trip and I'm guessing your food was lovely.

The fact that no one stood up and put the BJH in per place tells you everything you need to know about that group and until she goes you should probably hang out with others or be the one who stands up and calls her out next time she acts up.

It’s nothing to do with your meal. She’s projecting her eating disordered thinking on to you, and she has no decorum. She is clearly obsessive about the purity of food, orthorexia.

She’s a twat mate. Fuck her off