AIBU about the is feedback on my catering?

[Eminencegreige]

At Easter we had two friends, people we've known for some years and met at other's houses, come to stay with us. They brought with them their young adult son.

They arrived on the Thursday at around 3pm and I offered them some home-made cake. I don't often make cake, but they'd had a long journey and it was Easter and so I baked. The father and son ate most of the cake between them and said how good it was. We had G+Ts and nibbles at 6pm and not long after 7pm I served a lasagne with a salad and some garlic bread on the side. The recipe said it fed 10 and there were five of us. DH and I took decent-sized portions and the three of them finished up the rest, including all the garlic bread. I wasn't sure whether they were fans of dessert, but I'd bought a lemon tart in case they were. DH and I shared a quarter of the lemon tart with with some strawberries and cream and our guests had a quarter each. After that I jokingly asked if anyone would like cheese and the father and son had cheese and biscuits. They were very complimentary about all the food, said how lovely it was, which was very kind of them, but it was a bit alarming seeing how much they ate.

Next morning for breakfast I offered fresh fruit, muesli and granola/ cereals and yoghurt. Jokingly, after the men had finished off large bowls and had seconds, I offered toast and eggs and they had the best part of a loaf between them, and two scrambled eggs each... And so it went on.

They seemed to love cake, so over the weekend I baked another two and they ate them. They had a big cooked breakfast each morning and seemed to love puddings, so I made a pudding each evening, and they poured huge amounts of cream and custard over them.

We had a lovely weekend and I enjoyed having them here, but the food situation felt very stressful. One evening they took us out to eat at a local gastro-pub and it was noticeable that they ate less there because there were fixed portions.

This weekend we had someone else, who knows us all, stay for a couple of nights. She arrived and asked me where her cake was, which was bizarre because she's someone who doesn't eat cake. Turned out she'd heard from our Easter guests about their gargantuan feasts and all the cake and puddings on offer. Apparently the Easter friends had told her and others that I love feeding people and they'd been plied with cake and puddings. I didn't force them on them, I offered! The woman friend who came at Easter had posted on one What's App conversation about needing to go on the Fast 800 after her long weekend with us.

The friend who was here this weekend said that I went wrong when I offered them a pudding each evening and cake when they got back from walks or trips to places of interest. She said that if I offer people cake then I shouldn't be surprised if they eat it — all of it. I feel weirded out by the whole thing. I don't want anyone to go hungry when they stay in my home, but if I was offering too much food they could have eaten moderately and I would have scaled things back. I didn't force them to eat so much. AIBU to offer cake and pudding to guests?

Your guests sound greedy. Who the hell eats their way through a whole cake (or three) just because it’s there? Even if it’s delicious and you want to demonstrate appreciation for the baker, anything more than a second helping is bad manners.

Well, then they deal with the consequences, surely? ‘Nigel, you realise you’ve just used all the cream, right? Sorry, everyone, if you want any, you’re going to have to try to scrape it out of Nigel’s bowl!’

I was once around for food at a student friend’s houseshare. She’d made homemade mushroom soup and bread. We all had generous bowls. She offered second helpings. One of the other guests said ‘Oh, no, I don’t want to spoil my main course!’ Awkward silence. There was no main course. He’d anticipated some kind of three-course dinner, whereas to the hostess’s mind, it was just a casual meal of nice bread and soup.

To be fair we don't know how big the cake was. Plus it's pretty shit hosting to judge and condemn your guests for eating what you serve them. What a horrible way to live your life.

There are some very very odd attitudes on this thread - ungenerous, sanctimonious and frankly bizarre.

If you come to mine I'll serve you up a load of delicious food and drink and let you eat your fill with no judgment whatsoever! 😎

Some people have no internal locus of control when it comes to food. Sounds like your first friends are in that category. Generally comes from growing up without any control over what you eat, either because of your parents’ attitudes or because food was scarce.

The real villain of the piece is your second friend for lecturing you on what you should and shouldn’t have done.

I find it really bizarre that you have mentally measured the quantity of cream they’ve poured …. it appears you closely monitor quantities and measures.

I really do hope your guests see this post. I’d hate to eat at yours and be judged the way you’re doing.

But that’s not a reflection on you or you to stress about. Bad manners aren’t your fault, you can’t control other people.

Villain?!? Exaggeration much?!? This thread is the gift that keeps on giving.

It’s an expression 😂 https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/the-villain-of-the-piece

I thought you were upset about their comments about them eating so much they need to diet after visiting you? but now it's turned into 8 pages of you calling them greedy. You seem like a crappy friend with a weird attitude to hosting and food.

A totally exaggerated and unnecessary expression, yes. Goodness, people are weird 😅

You should probably just admit that you don’t understand the idiom rather than calling people weird for using it.

No, I really do understand it. Trust me. I just think it's really really odd.

This.

I am exactly the same.

I probably wouldn't be as gluttonous as the OP's guests but I might be if I were a man.

My grandma used to think it was bad hosting to have fewer than three desserts to choose from. I'd have been quite happy with any one of the desserts but because there were three I could never resist having a bit of each.

More recently I've been away on training courses for work at a hotel which does the most incredible buffet lunch. I would always go overboard at lunchtime and then mid afternoon they'd bring out petits fours to have with coffee and I couldn't resist.

At the same time I can see the OP's point, you don't want your guests to go hungry and it's better to overcater than undercater.

But there's probably a balance to be struck where you know your guests have had two helpings of lasagne and some dessert for lunch, you know you'll be feeding them again at dinner time, you don't really need to make another cake for the afternoon.

Just have a full biscuit tin on hand in case people want something with their afternoon coffee.

Op, the more you write, the more your food issues become apparent.
If hosting is so stressful for you then don't do it anymore, it shouldn't be this difficult!
Nobody leaves my house hungry, I always massively over-cater (I'm also pretty good at using up anything that's left in various 'original' recipes so nothing gets wasted!) but once something is gone, for example your first cake, it's gone - they'll have to have something else instead. Nobody forced you to make teo more cakes, that was ridiculous!

*two!

You did keep offering, jokingly or not. Just stick to what you’d planned on cooking & don’t keep offering extras. People will keep eating if someone else is cooking. Your food sounds lovely.

But you clearly don’t understand it (or didn’t read the post properly) or you wouldn’t have picked one word out of an idiomatic expression 🤷‍♀️

It’s equivalent to me saying that you’re like a dog with a bone on this point and you replying, “I can’t believe you said I’m like a dog when I’m clearly human?!? People are so weird??!!?”

Leaving this now. Enjoy your day.

Sounds like you were a good host, and they were rude and greedy, but making additional unplanned cakes seems a bit weird and overkill. As does offering eggs and toast when people had already eaten large bowls of cereal.

I am really sorry, but it is my opinion that you chose to use an expression that was disproportionate to the subject at hand. When Mrs Norris uses a very similar expression about Fanny Price (I'm sure you're familiar with Mansfield Park), the subject at hand is rather more serious than whether or not someone ate a bit too much cake.

I’ve got this image in my head now—this woman bursting through your door with a wild look in her eye, yelling, “Right! Where’s my cake?!” Haha

But I think there might’ve been a misunderstanding. To me It doesn't sound like they were complaining, more like they were saying how much they were fed, not that it was a bad thing! I’ve got a friend like that too, when she invites us over, she cooks enough to feed an entire village. It’s just so much food. Maybe your guests felt like they couldn’t say no and just kept eating to be polite?

But they were all one family, who witnessed this? So surely if the dad uses up all the cream, the mum and son would blame him not you! If my family were eating at a friend's and my DH or DS poured the whole serving over his plate, I'd be telling him off for being a greedy bastard, not judging my friend for her poor hosting! I've no idea why you didn't just say, if they asked for more cream 'Sorry I don't have any more, I didn't think your DH would pour a whole jug over his plate.'

It would have been fine once they'd eaten the first cake to then not have any other cake for the rest of the weekend. If they'd wanted something sweet you could have just said 'Sorry I only baked one cake, I thought it would last us all weekend. We've got fruit or biscuits if you want something sweet, or we can open those chocolates you brought.' They were only there for a weekend and one evening you ate out, so it's not as if it would have killed them to have one day without dessert. Either feed them what you think is an appropriate amount of food or keep offering more food, but don't then begrudge and judge them for eating it!
It was bizarre to resentfully keep on baking cakes.

You were generous and lovely and I bet they had the best weekend ever.
You were an excellent host , be proud.

Great to be thought of as a good host, don't knock it!