Badly-made food you love

[petite tête de chou]

Fake potatoes with fake gravy, IMO and Lawrys seasoning salt. Canned peas, ketchup, butter and black pepper. Campbells condensed cream of mushroom soup eaten straight from the can- husband refuses to watch me eat this one.

edited to add the ever-important ketchup to peas. wont eat em without it!

Edited July 21, 2004 by petite tête de chou (log)

[bleachboy]

Now that Lawry's seasoned salt has been mentioned.. toasted pita chips with a ton of Lawry's seasoned salt and a lot of butter is also delicious.

[tryska]

You must be channelling me...

One thing about old-school Filipino Moms is that they don't consider meat cooked until it resembles a charcoal briquette. None of this pink-in-the-middle crap for them... that'll make you die of some fatal disease or something along those lines.

Indian moms too. might explain my love of well-done steaks.

[tryska]

When I was a kid I liked Spaghetti-O's...

i think i liked them when i was a kid too.

opened a can with my adult senses a few years ago and thought it smelled like vomit.

[RSincere]

My son eats Spaghetti-os several times a week and they make me gag. My husband eats them at room temperature right out of the can.

Thought of another one. My mom would buy Swanson's Chicken a'la King in a can, but it was cheaper to buy cream of mushroom soup, so she'd mix the two in order to save money, and served it over toast. Usually she added leftover chicken. I love that "recipe" but haven't had it in a long time.

I'll pretty much eat anything if it's on a "shingle." I love anything a'la King and fake rarebit. Creamed anything on toast! Yum!

[My Confusing Horoscope]

So, what kind of badly-made food do love even though you know full well that they're far from the proper renditions? I don't mean things we know are bad for us or are inherently junk food, such as Jell-o, but food items that are badly seasoned, or overcooked or otherwise "ruined" in the eyes of a proper chef that you like just as much--or more--in its ruined form?

Well, no chef would ever make this, but in Cajun land we had a breakfast/supper dish called cush cush that was better if you let the cornmeal burn just a little bit at the end.

I am pretty sure all those recipes in the Prudhomme Family Cookbook calling for you to scorch then scrape the pot's sediments came from "mistakes" made by the mom cooking up all that food and dealing with her large family at the same time. And that's ALL good stuff!

Edited July 21, 2004 by My Confusing Horoscope (log)

[JennotJenn]

If we're talking about badly cooked food, then hitch me up to the burnt cheese love train. Cheese toast MUST be severely burnt American cheese.

Slightly burnt cornbread tastes great in stuffed peppers, too (my mom's version: extra hot breakfast sausage, corn, burnt cornbread and canned tomato...mmmmmmmmm...).

[hshiau]

Wow, this must be an Asian thing, then. My Chinese mom and dad always insisted that meat be really, truly dead -- not a trace of blood! -- before brought to table.

Not this Chinese family. It's only recently that my parents started cooking their steaks medium well. Before it was always medium rare....the way I like it.

My wife is Puerto Rican and all the meet her family cooks is thin and well done and has the consistency of shoe leather. I don't know if this is a latin thing or just her family.

[hshiau]

Also Swanson's Chicken Pot Pies, Domino's Pizza, and Campbell's Soup over pasta. All lazy single man food....which I don't eat anymore of course.

[sparrowgrass]

Barely burnt popcorn.

[malarkey]

How about when you fry eggs in bacon grease, and spoon some on the eggs? The top is full of the crunchy transparent bubbles...look out!

ohhh this is it. This is how my mother taught me to make an over easy egg. you cook it in bacon fat, and spoon the hot fat over the yolk till it turns white and then you're done.

wow.

Swanson's chicken pot pies! now, I haven't had one in ages, but I bet they taste crappy now. or do they....?

the burnt cheese love train LOL

somebody mentioned velveeta and Rotel tomatoes. That's a midwestern snack!

Also, the infamous green bean casserole. its gotta have a buttload of those crunchy fried onions on top. I adore that dish.

Edited July 22, 2004 by malarkey (log)

[lesfen]

Hamburger gravy and mashed potatoes. Oh buddy. I guess the only really badly made part about it is that I actually like it best with instant mashed potatoes.

[Hest88]

Swanson's chicken pot pies! now, I haven't had one in ages, but I bet they taste crappy now. or do they....?

I ate a lot of these in college. $99, filling, yet flavorful. They actually still taste good to me, basically because of the top and bottom crusts. Mmmm. I don't care if they don't have a lot of stuff in the filling, because I really only care about the crusts!

[eunny jang]

As long as we're talking about bad cooking...

I love burnt and almost-burnt anything - toast, crusts on meat, cheese, potatoes, pizza...mmmm, carcinogens.

[browniebaker]

Swanson's chicken pot pies! now, I haven't had one in ages, but I bet they taste crappy now. or do they....?

They're just as good as you remember. No matter how good a chicken pot pie I make from scratch now, sometimes I like to have my Swanson's in the little tinfoil pie plate. Stir those two layers of crust into the sauce so that the pastry is moistened, maybe a little gooey in some places, but still tender and a little crisp in other places.

[Muffin210]

I might be alone in this one, but I really like broccoli...even that completely over-steamed, limp cafeteria food broccoli...yummmmm...