My X was such a bad cook...

My mother was such a bad cook...

a pool of mayonnaise floated on top of her tuna salad.


~~~~~
NB: This thread was inspired by the line in 'Big Night' where one of the guests, sobbing, exclaims, "My mother was a terrible cook!"

[ShawtyCat]

My first boyfriend got me sick with pneumonia and then tried to make up for it by making me soup. I took one sip and ran for the sink and drank the fishes out of the sea. When I asked him what was in it he said" uh....chicken soup with veggies and black pepper, white pepper, red pepper lakes. It just tasted too bland to me"

I never let him cook again.

[Isa]

I can still see my first room mate trying to mash potatoes... before cooking them.

[ShawtyCat]

Youre kidding me right? Thats hilarious.

[chiffonade]

XH-2 and his mother fall into the "terrible cook" category.

XH-2 thought cooking was one of those duties that fell to the uneducated and he frequently looked down his nose on those who cook. This always made me wonder why he wooed me so hard when I was a culinary student.

I basically absorbed all cooking responsibility in our household. Even someone who loves to cook would occasionally like to have a plate of food placed in front of them which would require they do little more than wield a fork and knife. I made this desire clear to him and informed him that with both of us working full time, it was less than fair to expect me to do all the cooking.

He claimed ignorance about how to cook and insisted that I write down step by step instructions. So there's infringment #1...I don't get to simply eat, I have to instruct as well.

He balked at my instructions for whole roasted chicken, saying he wanted "boneless breast of chicken" dishes. I informed him that "boneless breast is tasteless, that's why it's always sauced." The closer to bone, the sweeter the meat, as the saying goes.

He finally produced a meal of (no surprise here) a salad that had chicken in it. He reveled at his own masterpiece which consisted of lettuce leaves placed attractively around the dish with the chicken salad plopped on top.

After his usual dose of 3 rum & cokes (yeah, he was a real prize), he blurted out that he attended a school in NY called The Natural Gourmet Cookery School. I was slackjawed. He BS'ed me into thinking he couldn't cook so he would not be asked to. Come to think of it, he frequently did things incorrectly so I wouldn't ask that he do them again. (Unfortunately, this included sex.)

He claimed he wanted to give it another try and aimed to prepare a Thai meal. He invited his brother and brother's girlfriend to this dinner. He shopped for ingredients (after looking at one of my books for guidance). Came the day of the dinner, he decided to begin drinking at 10:00 a.m. Needless to say he was $hitfaced by 12:00 noon and despite my urging that he needed to begin prepping, he continued to drink. Being unrecognizable by 1:00 p.m., I ran to the kitchen and threw together my first Thai meal under extreme pressure. I would not have done this if he hadn't invited company to partake of this meal with us.

Now for his mother...She was also an avid elbow-bender and roamed her house all day clutching a huge tumbler of rum & coke (drink preference ran in the family, I guess). She fancied herself quite the accomplished cook.

This woman is responsible for more cremations than your local funeral director. During one visit, she had a pan bubbling away on the stove...containing what were once beautiful salmon filets. I could have cried. Salmon's cooking time is extremely brief, not simmering away like a witch's cauldron! That marked the first time I ever left a piece of salmon on my plate.

Another time, she made this salty ham. I had a small piece and drank 7 glasses of water while at the table...never once getting up to pee!

She made a frangipane tart which probably would have been gorgeous, however, a drunk who doesn't believe in kitchen timers is doomed to frequent failure - and that was the case here as well.

THEN she refers to herself as "a chef" because she took a few courses. I graduated from Peter Kump's NY Cooking school where Nick Malgeri is the dean of pastry, Sarah Moulton used to be an instructor and James Peterson used to be the dean of students, and I have trouble referring to myself as "a chef"!!!!

This was a sick family that I'm happy to say I have rid myself of. Like Cher's description of Nick Cage in Moonstruck, I would have chewed off my own foot to get away from them.

[shroomgirl]

My sister in law is the mother of 5 children ranging in age from 16mo-17 years.....she considers cooking a chore, much like cleaning the toliets. She cooks 2-3meals a day everyday....they do not eat out but a couple times a year....not even ordered pizza. Her equipment is dismal and considers kitchen gifts Not gifts at all. Casseroles, Pasta, Pizza, Beany goup.....spices and herbs definately limited. She does not use alot of package mixes yet her scratch food is abysmal. When you love what you do there is usually a good/great product at the end....she does not care and it shows.

My maternal grandmother was such a bad cook...

HOW BAD WAS SHE?!?

She made chicken soup from a fryer and then she *roasted* the fryer and served it to her family for dinner!

Which explains why my Mom never got the hang of cooking, I suppose.

These stories are great! Thanks for sharing!

[Svadhisthana]

My mother's "recipe" for meatloaf:
1 pound of the cheapest ground beef you can find
1 package of campbells onion soup mix still DRY
1 egg
1/4 cup milk
1 sleeve of saltine crackers, crushed
Ketchup-lots of it
Combine everything but the ketchup, bake for a lifetime, cover in ketchup 1/2 way thru bake time, serve, and pick out little fingernail like pieces of dry onion.

Granted my mother had 5 us to raise on her own so cheap way the way to go. She is still in the mindframe that cheaper is best. There is this little grocery store that sells "slightly damaged" goods or the expired yesterday items and she is just pleased as punch that she bought a can of green beans for 19 cents that only has a little tiny ding. *sigh*

My sister's idea of cooking is to go thru the drive thru at McD's. A diet of big Mac's and fries has not done much for her girlish figure.

[shroomgirl]

Love your Gussow quote, I invited her to the market Aug 10th and a picnic Aug 11....you'll have to come meet her.

***My mom went through a stretch where she made phenominal food....then about the time she opened her own ad agency she started burning shtuff.....I cannot tell you how many pots we threw out. Good cook gone bad.

***My ex mother in law used to boil a pork roast and a beef roast together, serve it with jarred kumquats....I could never figure out the thought process behind that one. There were bizarre dishes coming out of her kitchen all the time. She also left food in open cans in the fridge....ummmmm.

[Svadhisthana]

I would love to come sometime-I'm really looking forward to the market here starting up again as well.


My mother in law commited several culinary crimes also-too many to list.

[Jill Reichow]

My MIL had "hotdish starter." She would serve a hotdish, then after dinner divide it into containers and put in the freezer. Every week or so, one would come out, she would add whatever leftovers were lanquishing in the fridge in "freezettes" as my hubby calls them. A new can of cream of mushroom soup was added and it was then baked for the meal. After dinner, she would divide the leftovers...do I need to continue? No wonder cream of mushroom soup gets such a bad rap. The day the hotdish starter(from lord knows how many years running) met it's demise was the day that DH and BIL sat down to dinner and found pineapple chunks in the hotdish, left over from the lua party for the relatives 9 months earlier. The garbage disposal ate well that evening.....She also had a bad habit of putting celery in things. Now I have no adversion to celery when it is chopped....but to just whack a stalk in 4 pieces and throw it in.....

My father, bless his heart, when I was sick and Mom was working, fixed lunch for me. I must have been about 10. He made tomato soup and grape juice for me. The problem was that he neglected to dilute the soup before he heated it...and he failed to add water to the frozen grape juice concentrate. And Mom wondered why I was worse when she got home..........

[chrose]

These are great stories. Chiff..well done, that was great (sorry you had to witness it) I had a girlfriend one time that I parted ways with. I saw her sometime later and she invited me to a cookout she was having. I arrived and she brought me into the kitchen to show me a platter of beautiful NY strips. She then said, but look what I got for you and me! And produced a 2lb Chuck Steak. My eyes welled with tears as I watched everyone enjoy their steaks and I went through plastic knife after plastic knife. She meant well though so I had to give her credit. Sniff...

Around the same time my housemate who never cooked anyhting in his life decided it was time to save a couple of bucks and start cooking a little for himself. He knew I cooked for myself all the time so he asked me for some help. I told him we start off easy and I'd get him some hamburger helper. (mind you I was not yet in the biz and this was a lonnnggg time ago!) I bought him the necessary ingredients. I came home one night to find a nasty looking mess in the sink. I knew something didn't go right.
The next morning I was greeted with "that stuff sucked!" I asked him to recount his actions. He said he cooked the noodles like he was supposed to. He cooked the meat, added the seasoning etc. Remembering the sink I asked him if he drained the noodles. He said...No! Was I supposed too?
To this day I crack up thinking about that! He never cooked again. Went to Brazil and found himself a wonderful woman who cooked!

[chiffonade]

Originally posted by Jill Reichow
My MIL had "hotdish starter."...A new can of cream of mushroom soup was added... After dinner, she would divide the leftovers...do I need to continue?

Does this sound hauntingly like that "friendship bread" that was going around some time ago? I knew someone who kept it up for 6 months.

If we were voting for most repulsive story in this thread my vote would go to Jill's hotdish starter post.

Jill, you have my most sincere condolences.

[lwunderlich]

Many years ago my husband and I were invited to a T-bone
dinner at a friend's home, a cattle feeder. We had come
early enough to see the raw meat--gorgeous inch and a half
porterhouse steaks, marbled, trimmed to perfection. I nearly cried when we were served a bunch of salisbury looking chunks
floating of meat in cream of mushroom gravy. The only way one could identify the source of the cut was the meatless t-bones in the gravy. Shudder, shudder.
Rue