Well, That Didn't Go Well

Well, that certainly did not go well. I invited some family members over for dinner to celebrate the holidays and to visit with our son while he is staying with us. I wanted to make something delicious that I could prepare ahead and that would please everyone. I chose a turkey lasagna recipe from Ina Garten's book "Family Style". It got good reviews and sounded really good. It had all the typical ingredients including turkey Italian sausage, goat cheese, mozzarella, ricotta, fresh herbs, etc. 


First of all, Ina Garten has never let me down until now. This recipe wasn't just bad, it was inedible. Can you imagine, inviting people over and proudly dishing up dinner and....yuck?

The flavors just weren't there in spite of lots of cheese, fresh basil and parsley, and Diestel turkey. But the worst thing was the pasta. The recipe calls for NOT boiling the noodles in advance, but pouring super hot water over them and letting them soak for 20 minutes. What bad advice. That pasta was barely softened. I boiled water in my electric kettle and poured it over the pasta in a 7 x 11" pan for 20 minutes as the recipe instructed. The pasta was somewhat softened after 20 minutes, but certainly not "done". I figured the rest would happen in the oven when it cooked in the sauce. That did not happen. 

I am amazed that my guests could even choke down a few mouthfuls. I was so embarrassed. If you have made this recipe, what was your experience? The online reviews are all raves. If I had boiled the noodles as I usually do when making lasagna, it would have been better, but still, it was pretty flavorless. 

Luckily one of my nephews had sent us a box of assorted brownies from the "Killer Brownie" company, which I served for dessert. At least people left with the taste of something good in their mouths.

Have you ever had a major recipe fail when entertaining? Share your experience and help me feel better. 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[sue s]

I feel for you! We've never had a recipe fail. Our epic fail came because we didn't know the oven wasn't working right! Sometime before Christmas a few years ago we were making pork chops and they seemed to be taking a really long time to cook. There was cooking but not much. We never thought about the oven. Then, AT CHRISTMAS, we tried to cook a tenderloin in the usual time frame. HOURS later, still not done. We'd gone through all the appetizers, put out more, the jokes were getting old. Finally resorted to a quick nuke just so we could eat. Hubby later tested the oven and it never got higher than about 200 degrees! New oven happened. Good thing we had family who were understanding.

[Kelli]

I'm so sorry about your lasagna 😢 that was a definite bummer. I did cheesey potatoes one year and baked them the called for time - put them on the table and they were hard 😱 our oven was on the blink 🙄 my FIL had some comments and I felt like a failure as a young wife way back then. Happens to all of us - try not to feel too bad. Your family obviously knows you can cook after all this time - hope you were able to enjoy the fellowship. Keep pressing on with new recipes - don't let it deter you!!🥰

[Ina]

yes, one year I under-cooked game hens. can you imagine? not.edible.

I make my lasagna noodles like you described. I soak them in hot water until they are soft and it works out great? leaves me with one less large pot to wash.

that's the worst to have a failure with company over for dinner.

[Linda Gilmore]

Oh, so sorry, Nicole.....all that work and then YUK. I think Ina is not great with Italian cooking. I either use the recipe on the lasagne noodle box or look up a Giada recipe.....her recipes have never failed me. I know I have had a few epic fails myself but my mind kindly does not let me remember them!!

[Cindy]

I have heard there is a product that is a “no boil” lasagna. Could Ina have forgotten to put that in the recipe?…and you used regular lasagna instead? A failure from Ina is rare!

[Cathy]

I had a similar experience as a new wife, trying to enertain a colleague of my husbands and his wife. I’d never met them before. I decided to make a lasagna, following my aunt’s recipe, and I did. Unfortunately she didn’t mention precooking the noodles…..

[Judy]

I stopped boiling my noodles years ago. No need to purchase no boil noodles. The key is to bake the lasagna covered with foil for 45 minutes and then for 15 minutes uncovered to brown the cheese a little. The noodles are thoroughly cooked and tender and my layers stay together. Before I learned this method my lasagna layers would slide apart because the noodles were too soft.

[Jan]

That's definitely embarrassing! 😳 But since it was family I'm sure they know you're a better cook/baker than the lasagna failure. Think of it as being fortunate you weren't serving it to non-family! It happens to all of us, if we're honest, & someday you'll laugh about it. Meanwhile, I'm pretty sure those brownies made up for a less than stellar main dish!

[Carolyn]

Oh no, I'm so sorry that happened! I don't make lasagna because it's too messy and not fun to make. My daughter made gluten free lasagna for our Christmas dinner and it was delicious. My big fail was Thanksgiving many years ago. We were living in NY and a group of church friends decided we would go see Space Jam and then head back to my house for a pot of chili and corn bread. It was great fun, but we decided we missed turkey, so after church on Sunday we all went back to my house for Turkey and all the trimmings. The turkey cooked forever and never cooked through although my thermometer said it was ready. Wound up with a new oven AND and new meat thermometer after that fiasco! 😂

[Anita]

Everyone has had some type of fail. You shouldn’t be embarrassed - but we all would be - just frustrated. All mistakes are just opportunities to learn. One time with a large group I had ordered several pans of Italian food from a local restaurant. I popped them all into the oven on warm. When I went to serve the food, each pan had a hard round plastic disc in the center. I had forgotten to remove the plastic covers which apparently just shrivel up into small hard discs in an oven - not melt into the food which they could have. I just kept my mouth shut, served the food, but never made that mistake again.

[Nancy Alderman]

As a young bride making my first thanksgiving dinner, I made pumpkin pie for dessert. The recipe called for a teaspoon of cloves. Well, all I’d ever known about cloves were that they were strange shaped spices. It’s really hard to measure out a teaspoonful of whole cloves, let me tell you! My mother was curious about the brown things in the pie… that’s when I found out about ground cloves 🙃

[Kerry L]

I agree with other readers Nicole! You are an excellent cook! We all have a fail sometime! Mine was a disastrous Christmas dinner with a very raw Beef Wellington. I always cooks my noodles with the boiling water method. Maybe there wasn’t enough sauce to soften them??? But I have found a few of Ina’s recipes disappointing. Have you tried Rosie Daykin books .. Butter and Let Me Feed You ? I think you would really like them!

[Sandra]

Sorry to hear about the lasagna fiasco. So frustrating when time and effort is put into something the doesn’t turn out. I’ve made lasagna without precooking the pasta. The first time I tried it the recipe said add 1/2 cup water to the sauce and cover with foil to bake, uncover to brown. Worked like a charm! I’ve done it since and not added extra liquid, just covered the pan and it turned out great. Who would think that an Ina recipe wouldn’t turn out. Good thing you had a great dessert!

[CarolE]

Sorry that happened. But everyone knows you are a good cook and despite that I bet everyone had a good time. I made a cake one time for Bunco and it was so dry. Since then, I never make anything for company that I haven't already made at least once beforehand for my husband and I to try.

[Carol Triebel]

I tried to recreate a molded jello recipe for a family birthday party. I added too many frozen raspberried and it didn't set. I served it in coffee cups with a spoon!

[Suzanne]

Ugh, so sorry that happened! Yes, of course, I’ve had cooking problems when having company over! The most recent one was at Thanksgiving 2022. My husband and I were cooking our turkey on our gas grill on our patio, like we always do. Unfortunately, it was a very windy day, and our grill's flame was actually being blown out! My husband had to go and re-light it many times. Instead of cooking in 3.5 hours, it took about 5… So, yeah, dinner was late!

[Madeline]

Recipe fail, but not entertaining anyone. Coincidently with an Ina Garten recipe. It was a butter pasta (maybe with lemon) and it called for way too much butter. Drenched. I totally made a note in the book for next time.

Those brownies are addicting! So good.

[Bridget]

After watching Emeril LaGasse NOT get a cake to come out of the pan on live TV I don't worry too much about a fail. I have had my share of fails for sure. There are other dishes my guests can eat and if they are there for the food they can go somewhere else :) Emeril saved the cake by turning it into a fool kind of dish with some fruit and chocolate sauce...

[JackiesStitches]

That had to have been beyond disappointing! I've never tried no cook lasagna because when I make lasagna it's typical for when we have guests and I can predict the outcome if I boil them first. I wonder if the 7x11 pan size versus a pot meant the water cooled off faster and then reduced cooking? The lasagna soups are popular now and a friend served the white lasagna version to us and shared the recipe. It uses uncooked lasagna noodles broken up but it was a soup. So easy to cook until done. Sounds like the pasta wasn't the only issue.