A Bad or Badly Made Food You Remember Fondly

[Barbara L]

All the talk about spaghetti brought back a memory that I would like to share. I simply adored my aunt. She was one of my favorite people in the world. They ate at our house sometimes, and we ate at theirs as well. My aunt's spaghetti always tasted good, but very often a lot of the spaghetti noodles stuck together. They looked like little bundles of sticks. My mom's spaghetti was always better, but I would not have missed my Aunt Janet's spaghetti dinners for anything in the world. Every once in awhile a few of my spaghetti noodles will stick together, and it always brings a smile to my face as I remember the wonderful times I had with my aunt (who is no longer with us), uncle, and cousins.

If you have a similar story, please share it with us!

Barbara

 

[quicksilver]

Back in the early 80's I was very active in my community. Part of my volunteerism was visiting the elderly at a senior citizen development. It was a new 14 story highrise, where the residents had their own small apartments, and could either choose to cook, or eat in the public diningroom.
One lady in her 80s at the time befriended me. From then on, I became hers. She was so adorable. Well she was so excited to have a friend she invited me to lunch, and asked if I liked tunafish salad sandwich. I said sure.
So on the appointed day I arrived, and asked if I could help. She said no, she had been preparing for a day.
After showing me the apartment, family photos, etc,
she sat me in her dinette.
Out came a plate stacked with bread, then pickles, then a boul of tuna salad. EEKS!
It was tuna, packed in oil, not drained, with mayo and celery. She didn't drain the oil! It was like oil soup.
Well I eat tuna salad, but packed in water and drained.

I don't know how I got that sandwich down, but my sweet friend Essie from then on told everyone that I came for lunch til the day she died.
That simple sandwich turned in to a priceless and lifelong memory.
​

 

[miniman]

My grandmother's pasta salads were notorious in the family. I'm not quite sure how she made them but they were like glue. Still, I loved her a lot and greatly miss her.

 

[ironchef]

The other day, we had some leftover kalbi chicken from a luncheon marinating, so the executive chef says we can use it for our staff meal. The person whose turn it was to make staff meal, decides to use it in a pasta. He decides to make a cream sauce, and flavor the sauce with cumin (yuck), curry (WTF?), lemon and thyme (he's smoking crack). He then tosses it together with the kalbi chicken, overcooked penne pasta (you must be retarded if you can overcook penne). It was pretty much the most disgusting staff meal we've had in a looooooong time.

 

[GB]

My best friend and I were visitng my grandparents in FL when we were about 13 or 14. Grandma was always an amzing cook. Well one night she made a roast with mashed potatoes. We are still not sure why, but she decided to use her food processor to make them. Seth and I were both brought up to have good manners. We each took a bite and nearly gagged on the potato glue she had just made. Gma was still in the kitchen (she made us start without her) and asked how they were. We told her they were delicious and prceeded to shovel them into our mouths forcing smiles the whole time. Gma. Sat down and took one bite and ran to the trash can asking what was the matter with us kids that we thought those were good . She never made mashed potatoes that way again.

 

[simplicity]

My grandmother's doughnuts. She lived 1000 miles from us and we could only afford to visit every other year or so. No cakes nor pies nor puddings. She always made doughnuts. When I was very young I treasured these.

As both of us grew older, her cooking skills began to fail as my appreciation of good food grew.

She continued to make doughnuts to please us, as I became more critical. I continued to praise her doughnuts, although they became, late in life, almost inedible.

Her other grandchildren must have thought the same. After her death, a relative asked me what personal thing I wanted. I replied "Grandma's doughnut cutter." Her response was "Get in line". The doughnut cutter turned into a most requested item.

We all had the same cherished memories.

 

[buckytom]

when i was a kid, my mom used to make the most boring, horrible looking chicken soup in the world. she is a fantastic cook, but her soup was terrible.

my brother hated it, saying "that it looked like dishwater leftover from cleaning the pots and pans".

thankfully, she was given a few recipes and eventually came to make very good soup.

 

[Constance]

My mother loved tapioca pudding, but my dad and I hated it. We went to visit her Aunt Velma up in Ottawa, Il when I was a little girl, and Auntie made lunch for us, including my mom's favorite tapioca pudding for dessert. Aunt Velma was a dear lady, and we didn't want to hurt her feelings, so when she got up to go to the kitchen, my mom switched her empty tapioca dish with mine. Dad then asked for another glass of tea, and mom switched dishes again, finishing off his as well.
Then, Aunt Velma, knowing how much my mom loved tapioca, insisted that she have a "second helping."
It was a long time before mom craved tapioca pudding again.

 

[MexicoKaren]

One of the things my mom made when she was in a hurry for dinner had only three ingredients: hamburger and mushroom soup, served over minute rice. Canned green beans on the side. But amazingly enough, that still is comfort food for me. Over the years, I've doctored it a bit - added chopped onion, mushrooms, a little sour cream, used better rice. I still make it occasionally, and I still open a can of green beans to go with it.

 

[JGDean]

Both of my most memorable experiences were self-inflicted. The wall paper glue food processor mashed potatoes and inedible tuna salad heavily seasoned with cumin; the cat wouldn't even touch it!

 

[Fisher's Mom]

Ahhh, there are so many to choose from. My mom was a horrible cook and she taught me everything she knew. I haven't eaten a bite of meatloaf in 36 years because of the "special" way my mom prepared it. Ditto for fish. But we always sat down at the table together so I could slip at least some of the offending meal to the dogs.

 

[Adillo303]

I lived close to gramma and saw her often. Once when I had a cold, she decided to whip up a home remedy for me. It involved Blackberry Brandy and probably bats wings and snails tails, or so I thought. She was warming it on the stove and it flared. She singed a small area of her hair in front. That area turned white for the rest of her life till it was all white.

Every time that I saw it, I thought of her making me that cold remedy. It worked, of course it did! Anything your Gramma makes has to work, too much love in it for it not to work.