to lie about my pasta sauce?

[TerryHall]

DD has a friend whose mum scares the living shit out of me. Perfect house, etc. Always organising wholesome, educational activities for the girls.

DD's friend said to me last week "I love the pasta here. My mum's so pleased I'll eat veg at your house. She says can you text her the recipe".

It's Dolmio with added sweetcorn and peas (yeah, grim, I know).

AIBU to say it's secret recipe of my nan's so I can't possibly tell her?

No you can’t send that 😂😂
that’s clearly of the back of the jar

It’s short for Herbert. He works on the production line, sometimes a bit of Herb is included by accident.

Right - thank you all for the replies. You're excellent sports, and many of you also up for some petty deceit - special thanks to you.

I may use the vague "tomato" base line, or I might get over myself and be honest. Either way, you're all ace - thanks again.

I was on holiday in Italy and called into a small village store to buy some bread and cheese for lunch. The Italian man in front of me in the queue was buying some dried pasta and a jar of Dolmio, so you’re in good company.

Yeah I’d be pretty suspicious. If she’s so ‘wholesome’ she probably suspects it’s not homemade and wants to find out what you’re feeding her daughter. It may be legit, who knows.

basically the jar sauce is made like this- Use oil to sauté onions and garlic, add tinned toms, tomato purée, sugar and salt, wang in parsley and basil and cook gently, if you fancy a bit of random mystery herb chuck a bit of aromat in there - I’ve no idea what natural flavouring is

Excellent point - it's probably the sugar and salt making it so tasty - so I can pretend those are my secret ingredients. If they're added from scratch, they're fair game, right?

Give her the ingredients on the dolmeo jar and the stuff you add. Say you stick a pinch of sugar in or something.

Yanbu - secret recipe it all the way

You could tell her that it's just tomato sauce with vegetables. You don't have to specify what "tomato sauce" is, exactly.

I do jt all of the time 😂😂. Just look up a recipe and send it to her. It will never be as good as yours!!

Yep totally fair game, but I would totally own the fact it’s dolmio tomato based sauces are not just convenient they are also one of the least processed ‘convenience’ foods because they are so basic

I feel like you’d look a bit daft and a lot worse for refusing to share a ‘secret recipe’ than just saying it’s a jar. I’d honesty think someone was batshit for refusing to share a secret pasta sauce recipe under those circumstances tbh. If she looks down her nose at you she’s an arse. Just own it, honestly, if she said it was a jar to you and was laughing about it, bet you wouldn’t think twice about it because she’d probably be totally confident telling you! X

I make the best Chocolate fudge cake, passed down from my aunt Betty Crocker…..

I use honey instead of sugar…it really gives it depth.

Put the dolmio ingredients into ChatGPT and it it to generate a liked recipe with quantities

even if she is a ‘whole foods only’ fan you would be doing her a favour by telling her her kid loves a jar of sauce with corn in it - so much pressure on mums these days - share the simple wins

Just tinkle laugh and say “oh you know, just a tomato base with whatever veg I have to hand”, if she pushes then it’s onion, garlic and passata reduced to thicken and chuck in veg or basil or cheese. Basically all it is anyway. Don’t need salt or sugar added

Omg like the episode of friend with phoebes cookie recipe passed down from nestle tollhouse 😂😂😂😂😂

Just tell her it's a basic passata with a few herbs and garlic /onion chucked in and you sometimes blitz whatever you have to hand e.g carrots into it.

Not really a recipe as such. Quite basic.

Simple pasta sauce, cook a tin of good whole tomatoes, Mutti or the like, with garlic cloves, salt, basil leaves. Or use whole tomatoes. Strain it and it’s very tasty. Just say it’s that. Maybe a secret ingredient they you’re not prepared to share.

Only a real wanker would tell a mum trying to encourage her kid to eat food that you have a 'secret recipe'.
I cook everything from scratch, I wouldn't judge a good jar recommendation my child enjoyed but I would massively judge a gatekeepery 'secret recipe' excuse!

Look at the ingredients on the side of the jar and list them along side your frozen veg: tomatoes, onion, concentrated tomato purée, basil, peas, sweet corn.

Ha ha tell her you make it from freshly picked organic tomatoes from your allotment PLEEEEASE!!!!!

Tell her that you make it with tomatoes that you grow yourself, then peel and deseed before putting them through a fine sieve, cooked with vegetables and herbs you grow in your allotment. Oh, and the olive oil comes from your relatives in Italy, they handpick the olives and make their own oil. And the salt, you collected from your last trip to the sea, dried the water and so on.
Just kidding, tell her the truth!