# Amateur home chefs: what dish have you made once but will \*never\* do again? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** food-cooking\ **Created:** [September 20, 2024, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532 "2024-09-20T22:00:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/21 "2024-09-21T01:14:05Z")
“biryani is perhaps one of our most elaborate rice dishes.” … (Description, 3/4 page ingredient list, more than a page of directions) … "Biryani is quite definitely not an everyday dish. It is served at weddings and important dinners. Try serving it at a late supper party. It was, and is, a dish worthy of a king. " But i don’t see anything about praying. Lots of details about getting this and that stage exactly right, but it’s just “be careful”, not, “you’re going to mess up.” ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/22 "2024-09-21T01:15:01Z")
> [@Mighty\_Mouse](#): > > Many years ago, I made traditional Cantonese-style mooncakes for the Chinese Harvest Moon Festival. > > Never again. Aren’t those, like baklava, fairly easy to buy commercially? ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/23 "2024-09-21T01:17:01Z")
Definitely thinking of tamales. The Hispanic church ladies used to sell them outside Mass for a fundraiser and my gosh they were sooooo good, but I will never try that again myself. Just too much work. Scratch cakes cover a vast range. ‘Cockeyed Cake’ a chocolate oil cake you mix in the pan, is so easy we used to make one as a snack when we got home from school, all the way to multi-layered multi-filling tortes fit for visiting nobility. Mixes, feh. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/24 "2024-09-21T01:21:24Z")
There are tons of imported ones that come in decorative boxes. In the days when WeChat was a lot more open, there were many horror videos circulating about the sanitary practices of industry in Guangdong. And of mislabeled products that said they were made in Taiwan, but were actually made in Mainland China. There are US bakeries making them. We buy four of them each year. This year they were $8 each. I make the “snow skin” version nowadays. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/21906_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/25 "2024-09-21T01:27:11Z")
I interpreted the subject wrong and went immediately to something I tried that was an unmitigated failure. I’ve probably mentioned it on the board sometime in the past, but here I go again. Meatloaf with cornflakes in place of breadcrumbs. Don’t do it. Trust me. Never ever again! The only reason I ate it all is because I was a poor student at the time and I couldn’t afford to waste that much ground beef. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/26 "2024-09-21T01:27:12Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > I was thinking about the one time I tried to make my own baklava – except it wasn’t just me, I remember both my mom (who was visiting for the week) and my wife having to help with the assembly. All that separating of the phyllo dough and layering it with the filling and brushing on the butter, over and over and over… It was way too much effort, and I wound up taking most of it to work and giving it away because there was no way I could eat that much baklava. I’ll just stick with ordering it for dessert when we go to the Greek restaurant. You made the phyllo dough by hand from scratch? I vaguely remember my mother making baklava but starting with phyllo dough purchased from the supermarket. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/27 "2024-09-21T01:31:53Z")
For cakes, i recommend _The Cake Bible_, by Rose Levy Beranbaum. Before writing cook books, she worked in the commercial cake mix industry, so a lot of her cakes are what the mixes aspire to be. And her instructions are clear and generally straightforward. I’ve never had a failure following her recipes. (She can be excessively specific. I’ve had many successes not following her instructions exactly, and the cake is pretty much identical to if i do.) She has some fancy complicated cakes, but the basics are pretty basic, and you can tell from the recipe what you are getting in for. Her basic yellow cake is the best basic yellow cake I’ve had, and other than separating a lot of eggs (which isn’t required, just suggested) it’s pretty easy to make. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/28 "2024-09-21T01:35:53Z")
I made [this pork rillette](https://youtu.be/aTwNgNh_Ig0) once. It was delicious but not worth the effort. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/29 "2024-09-21T01:43:07Z")
90% of my quick breads, cupcakes, etc. are from scratch, but maybe that’s because I’m single and it would be too tempting to simply make one if I have a mix available. The one exception is when I’m craving something from Ghirardelli. For that, I use the mix. For me, it’s the official IKEA recipe for their Swedish meatballs. They were good, but it also required several sub-recipes, and I’m not just talking the meatballs, and the sauce. It was more complicated than that. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/30 "2024-09-21T01:54:52Z")
I too, as a retired professional baker, find cake mixes to often be very good. I prefer scratch, and do it several times a year, but when I made specialty cakes, tiered, for weddings and anniversaries, Duncan Hines is consistently good. And like you I make icing from scratch. Never did find a good canned frosting. For white icing have you ever tried using almond flavor instead of vanilla? I like what I get with that. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/31 "2024-09-21T01:58:52Z")
Didn’t get this in on time. I once made Swedish meatballs. It was for a themed dinner for the television show Babylon 5. G’kar was hosting a friend and the friend was surprised G’kar had found the ingredients for a Narn dish called breen. He was told this was actually an Earth dish that was very similar, called Swedish meatballs, and that every culture seemed to have it’s own version of them. ---
**Author:** ![romansperson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/romansperson/32/17100_2.png) [@romansperson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/romansperson)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/32 "2024-09-21T02:01:47Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > You made the phyllo dough by hand from scratch? I vaguely remember my mother making baklava but starting with phyllo dough purchased from the supermarket. Oh yes, this reminds me … puff pastry. It’s a giant pain in the ass to make and the storebought version is just as good. Not going there again. ---
**Author:** ![DaveUnknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/94ad74/32.png) [@DaveUnknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaveUnknown)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/33 "2024-09-21T02:04:40Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > Definitely thinking of tamales. This is better with a few people. I made the somewhat similar Venezuelan version, Hallacas, with a Venezuelan friend and her family and it took 2 days. Lots of steps, sometimes tedious assembly, lots of shopping for ingredients, fragile sub-assemblies, but the results were great. I would participate in the making of them again, but not on my own. I don’t think it’s meant to be done by fewer than 3 people anyway. I don’t like making fried chicken-- I just go to Popeyes. It’s not worth using all the oil and never tastes as good. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/34 "2024-09-21T03:02:39Z")
No offense. Seriously. But y’all are kinda lazy. I’ve done many of what you’ve done and yeah, it was work, but it was worthwhile. Maybe I’m a masochist, but there is an incredible reward for the time and effort spent on a meal. I love the long process, it makes me glow inside. Now one time I had a big leg of lamb I planned to grill for my gf’s family. I peeled and inserted a hundred cloves of garlic. Exhausted from that culinary feat, I forgot to trim off all the extra fat. I actually had helped my buddy kill the lamb and do the basic butchering. Never cleaned it up. Went home with a leg wrapped in brown paper. Felt like a caveman. So a while after placing it on a medium heat grill, the melting fat ignited. I didn’t call 911, but only because I reacted immediately and appropriately. Close call, but I’m good in an emergency. We ate and enjoyed the meal. The burnt parts were prized! My MIL laughed about how I had a major fire, but my lamb was delicious, while my gf’s mashed potatoes were too lumpy. I love her. My gf’s family tells the story often and I keep hoping they’ll forget. I’ve grilled leg of lamb since, but always trim judiciously. ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/35 "2024-09-21T03:04:47Z")
No, I didn’t make the phyllo myself, I bought it frozen. But it was still a lot of work. I remember the dough being very difficult to work with. This was probably about 15 years ago, so I don’t remember all the details, but it took three of us the better part of an afternoon to put the thing together. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/36 "2024-09-21T03:09:18Z")
My gf’s ox tail soup preparation is stretched out over 3 days. We have a standing order for oxtail, but the farm only slaughters a couple beef a year. And each ox only has one tail. I’ve told her that if she goes before I do, it’s the loss of the oxtail soup that I’d suffer the most. don’t have the recipe. I do the day two flambé (she isn’t trusted with open flames) , but that’s the only part I know. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/37 "2024-09-21T03:10:41Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > the better part of an afternoon Heh. Less than a fortnight and you’re complaining? /stonedposting ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/38 "2024-09-21T03:29:29Z")
My oxtail soup takes 2 days. But there’s not a lot of active work, and the timing is all very forgiving. ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/39 "2024-09-21T04:00:54Z")
This is a childhood memory, so it’s fuzzy. I made a chess pie. Don’t remember how it tasted, but I think it was good. What I do remember is stating that it must be called chess pie because it’s so hard to make. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2024, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532/40 "2024-09-21T04:08:52Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > No offense. Seriously. But y’all are kinda lazy. It’s about the results. Can you achieve a similar result with a lot less effort? Often you can. Or, the effort is not worth the effort. If the extra effort results in a superior final product then great! Also (just saying) a long time cooking is not the same as a lot of effort. I am a big fan of low and slow cooking. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amateur-home-chefs-what-dish-have-you-made-once-but-will-never-do-again/1007532.md?page=3)