Crème Brûlée that was crusted with salt instead of sugar.
On purpose? 
He loved it, but he has a much higher threshold for disgust than I do (or maybe I do, since I’ll eat SpaghettioO’s and he wouldn’t touch those). I know there was a raw egg mixed in to it as well, but I’ve had those and they didn’t taste bad.
One meal that I had at an Outback was pretty bad. I think I had ordered a ribeye and what came out was like a small hamburger steak, very thin and sad. I even asked the next employee who walked past us if this was indeed ribeye. It tasted very salty and had a nasty flavor like liver.
I once ordered a fancy steak that came to the table basically as a big single piece of fat. There is a difference between well marbled and inedible.
A long time ago I was on a business trip with my Dad at a remote but nice restaurant. The side dish I ordered was fresh sauted mushrooms. What I got was wet mushrooms obviously from a can of stems and pieces, barely warmed up. I got up and found the menu again to make sure I had not read it wrong. Not terrible I guess, but we still sometimes bring it up. I don’t think I have ever really had a meal from hell at a restaurant, but I certainly have had food poisoning 4 or so times from restaurants, which doesn’t count for this thread.
There could have been a language barrier and I ordered the wrong potato product or they were sold out of fries or something, don’t remember. As said, this was late at night and, to set the scene, most other patrons were lubed up from closing the local bars (as had my colleague and I).
Definitely wings, I got them for the novelty.
(italics added for emphasis)
How brave of your to admit this!
(quietly makes a note to never, ever eat at Lancia’s house without checking menu! 
)
Semi-seriously though, I have noticed a point (one I’ve heard repeated online repeatedly) that restaurants that don’t emphasize soups are notorious for using premade single serving soups that they heat for the rare occasions it’s ordered off the menu. Cost-wise, it doesn’t surprise me, and my wife has often claimed that the various ‘tomato soups’ she’s had at a lot of places tastes exactly the same as Campbells.
Another, similar issue is when you order a dish that spends 3/4 of it’s description on the sauce applied, but zero on the food itself, you should expect premade / pre-bought base with only said sauce being made in-house. Various chicken tenders and bread puddings being the ones I notice the most for the above.
I keep seeing people mention getting food poisoning from restaurants. Well, I’m the guy who eats the macaroni salad that’s been sitting out on the picnic table in the sun all day (after chasing off the flies, I don’t lack couth) and I don’t remember ever getting food poisoning from a restaurant meal.
But I do recall an oyster festival in Pittsburgh a few years ago. I ate many oysters, mostly raw. The next day I was unwell. Worried about the oysters (which were delicious) led to my calling the Health Department. The phone tree there said, “If you are calling regarding gastrointestinal concerns following the Oyster Festival please press one now”. IIRC, vibriosis was the problem.
The first time I went to an Outback, I also had one of the best cooked steaks in my life – very close to my favorite steakhouse steak.
I like Germany and I like German food.
But do not go to a Chinese restaurant in Germany.
I’m a New Yorker where good Chinese restaurants are common, So when I was taken to one in Munich (back in 1980) I was a little apprehensive, but the food was fantastic.
The two times I got food poisoning from restaurant food the food actually tasted pretty good. My brother and I got Chinese takeout, and he woke up in the wee hours of the morning ralphing. I thought I’d gotten lucky, but as soon as I went out the door to go to work it hit me. The second time was at a Mexican takeout counter in Downtown Brooklyn. I had lunch there, and it hit me right before dinner. Unfortunately, my girl friend and I were having friends over for dinner. She married me anyway.
I attended Meat Cutters school (butcher school) many years ago. They told us that a dead chicken won’t bruise. Processed chickens are drained of blood immediately after they are killed. No blood, no bruise. That doesn’t mean the chicken cannot be abused after death, no sirree. But the damage won’t create a bloody bruise.
My wife and I were in a Foodie MeetUp group several years back. We made some good friends that way, and got to eat at some good restaurants. One of the restaurants we went to was a vegetarian place that had been getting good reviews. We’re not vegetarians at all, but we’re pretty adventurous and hey, good food is good food, so we went.
I ordered a vegan grilled cheese, which consisted of a thin slice of vegan cheese between two slices of cardboard that kinda looked like bread, if you squinted. I ate about half of it before I gave up. The cheese itself- what little I got- was decent, but the “bread” was completely tasteless.
I also ordered a bowl of lentil soup- because I figured that if anyone could make a good lentil soup, it’d be a vegetarian chef. I think almost everyone else also ordered the soup. And man, did we regret it. It had absolutely zero flavor, and the texture was lumpy and runny. The only saving grace for that soup was that it was a bit above room temperature. I ate maybe three spoonfuls and pushed the bowl as far away from me as I could. Nobody at the table ate even half of their soup.
I mean, this was a vegetarian restaurant. How do vegetarians screw up lentil soup?
The only good thing about that restaurant was that just across the street there was an excellent gelato place.
The worst value I’ve gotten for a meal which I am not sure was good or not was bone marrow at the Epcot Food and Wine festival for $15. Which consisted of 2 smallish bones with very little marrow in them. Like 2 bites worth of marrow total. Now granted, some may have already melted and landed on the tiny bit of vegetables that came with it, but I couldn’t really tell.
So at this point I’m not even sure if I like bone marrow or not because there was so little of it.
This is the bone marrow I got in Budapest about five years ago for about $10 (might have been closer to $7).
Pure. Meat. Butter. Heaven. I know it’s not sexy, but damn, it’s good. That was the best thing I ate that trip.
I know a few restaurants that serve this. If reasonably priced I always order it, especially if served with toast and butter.
Around thirty years ago, we made the same mistake in Lyon, based on the same reasoning. Ugh.
The Sand Dab at a seafood restaurant in Pismo Beach. We arrived about 30 minutes before closing and the staff clearly thought they were done for the night. But it was also one of two restaurants open in the whole town at the time and we had little choice.
It was disgusting and we just walked out.