Is there such thing as a badly written recipe in a cookbook?

[LiquoriceWheel]

This is a bit of a rant but I was wondering if anyone has come across a recipe that tasted horrible despite doing everything correctly. I've just made some lemon biscuits and they taste repulsive. The recipe was 'easy', used common ingredients and a normal biscuit making method.

Basically, cream together butter, sugar, zest of three lemons and slowly add a lightly beaten egg. Sift flour and mix until dough just formed. Put in cling film and chill in fridge. Roll out and cut out biscuits. Chill and bake in oven. You get the idea, pretty simple right?

So why do they taste horrible?! I carefully weighed each ingredient and was extremely careful 'zesting' the lemons. I'm confident I didn't do anything wrong so I'm blaming the recipe.

Argh, so annoyed - I've never met a biscuit I didn't like UNTIL NOW

I used real lemons but the biscuits tasted sort of artificial?
It sounds like you might have used waxed lemons.
I always assume lemons are waxed unless I buy specifically UNWAXED lemons.
So you ended up with a bunch of wax flavouring your biscuits.

Apart from that I think they sound delicious.

I made a Mary Berry Orange cake with orange zest and it tasted awful

I concluded in the end it was wax or other chemical on the oranges. I wash them really carefully now with boiling water.

Were the biscuits alright apart from the taste? Was the texture and everything ok?

I have come across some bad recipes. Ginger biscuits that were completely dry and crumbly - obvs not enough liquid in the recipe.

I hated the Primrose Bakery book with a passion - I tried numerous recipes from it, seduced by the pretty photos and descriptions. But they ranged from meh to pretty horrible. I couldn't understand how the owners ran a successful bakery endorsed by celebrity customers, using those recipes. Their cupcakes were dreadful - I tried them several times, following the recipe to the letter, and they always came out bland and doughy.

Flighty yes that's the one! Made me so bloody angry as it's such a waste!