Worst marine culinary disaster

[extravert]

What's everyone's worst meal on board, either cooked by themselves or a domestically inept crew?

Our unforgettably disgusting disaster was by somone who obviously lived on frozen meals all his life. Stumped without either a freezer or a microwave his best effort was to boil some pasta until well past death and then chuck a load of cheese on it. The resulting concrete like concoction would have served for sea defence foundations, and is still referred to as pastacrete. Even the ever hopeful seagulls wouldn't eat it.

<hr width=100% size=1>One day, I want to be a real sailor. In the mean time I'll just keep tri-ing.

 

[ParaHandy]

Hopeful seagull ...

well, if couldn't fire an outboard that's ignominy ... would a concrete concoction be a concretion?

my disaster was inviting friends to drink a truly old (but respectable) bottle of port. the commonest excuse wiz "a bad heid" in the morning so i just had to drink nearly all of it. it had a happy ending, though, was like usual spring lamb the following morning ...

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[Evadne]

1) The first (and last) pot noodle I ever tasted.
2) Spaghetti, tinned sweetcorn and tinned meatball stew while rolling our guts out at anchor behind Dungeness. The worst part was that it tasted the same coming back up as it did going down.

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[Twister_Ken]

A bottle of Italian red wine, that had never seen a grape. Truly disgusting. When 97% of the bottle was poured over the side, it just lay there like a dead red jellyfish, not dissipating into the surrounding water at all.

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.writeforweb.com/twister1>Let's Twist Again</A>

 

[jimi]

Either
1)fried Fray Bentos pie
or
2)Cauliflower, stilton & soy sauce

<hr width=100% size=1>I Have The Body Of A God... Buddha

 

[tugboat]

Don't make someone laugh when they have a mouthful of chicken supreme and rice unless you want your bulkheads pebble-dashed. It happened to me-Yeccchh!

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[Talulah]

Here's a Breakfast Story...
My mother hated sailing but would under protest go along to keep father company.
Whilst on a short trip my father studied the chart in the open air of the cockpit. Meanwhile, down below is mother preparing a fry up as only she knew how. As the bacon, sausages and whatever slowly chared to a deep black she felt sicker and sicker not helped by the motion of the boat. Finally, realising that breakfast was just not going to work she took the pan and in one almighty throw launched the contents out of the hatch. My father, a bit of a stick in the mud said 'Ann. How could you?" as he noticed a speck had fallen on his chart. What he didn't know was that down below the rest of the breakfast was now dripping off the coachroof ceiling.

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[Cornishman]

The "old man" ordered a cadet to make the officers a cup of coffee. The lad returned with three mugs of a weird looking luke warm substance which, after close questioning of the miscreant, turned out to be Bisto powder dissolved in tap water and then heated in a saucepan on the gas stove until it began to steam a bit. UHT milk compounded the offence!

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[jhr]

A plate of cold Smash - instant mash. The chef du jour hadn't realised that you needed to boil the water before adding it to the powder, and had mixed it cold. In an attempt to put things right, he then tried heating up the mixture on the stove, burning it. As he hadn't mixed it up very well anyway, we were served a combination of (a) undissolved potato powder, (b) cold mash, and (c) burnt (a) and (b) /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif.

He was relieved of his responsibilities shortly afterwards.

<hr width=100% size=1>Je suis Marxiste - tendance Groucho

 

[extravert]

1) fried Fray Bentos pie

Is that battered and deep fried, like Scottish chipshop pizzas, or just lightly sautéed?

<hr width=100% size=1>One day, I want to be a real sailor. In the mean time I'll just keep tri-ing.

 

[steve_cronin]

How about....

The morning my wife fried the eggs in the outboard gear oil I'd left in the pan on top of the chip oil from the night before?

Steev Cronin



<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[penfold]

I can relate a similar incident involving Smash(TM); we were anchored in Carradale bay on the way how at the end of a weeks cruise, and we were a little low on provisions, so my old man thought he'd try to make stovies out of Smash(TM) and some leftover Cheddar. The result was a glutinous and alarmingly orange-tinted paste that you could have bedded seacocks on. As has been mentioned in other posts, even the previously iron-stomached shitehawks gave the stuff a wide berth when it was jettisoned over the side, where it slowly sank as a homogeneous lump. Viewed through the uncharacteristically clear water the next morning, it was disturbing to note that it was still intact and untouched by the fish or crabs. No doubt it's still there!

cheers,
david

<hr width=100% size=1>What we are dealin' with here is a complete lack of respect for the law....

 

[peterb]

I don't think any of these match Des Sleightholme's story of the cooked up gash bucket. "Ugh! but beautifully cooked!"

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[Kristal]

Well, this may not quite a culinary effort, but pretty close to a disaster...

Nancy Blackett's paraffin stove begins to play up, so, being well prepared, we break out the camping stoves. About twenty minutes into the cooking of a curry, I notice flames licking at the gas bottle connector, and alert the skipper.

"Bung it over the side, quick," he orders. I frisbee the offending stove into the water where, upon contact with the water, it explodes violently, sending enormous bubbles of butane to the surface about 50 yards away. I was not permitted to flick matches at the bubbles.

If I had any doubts about returning Crystal to paraffin power, they disappeared as quickly as the stove.

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.crystaltwo.co.uk/>Crystal II in Pictures</A>

 

[tamarnessie]

When I took my Day Skipper practical with a certain sailing school on the Solent, which will remain nameless to protect the innocent (well, the instructor anyway), the majority of the stores on board had been purchased in the local Happy Shopper. By far the most revolting thing we attempted eat that week was Happy Shopper's excuse for a cheese & tomato pizza. It's put me off pizza for good.
Mind you, my mashed potato was no better, you could pebbledash walls with it.

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[pragmatist]

If you've ever had the misfortune of veggie kids then you might have tried tinned vegetarian sausages. Never again.

A near disaster was when the lid of the black pepper pot came off and the entire contents headed into the stew - judicious skimming removed sufficient to make it bearable though

<hr width=100% size=1>a pragmatist is an optimist with a boat in the UK

 

[Athene V30]

In my youth I prepared a curry and rice. The curry was fine but the rice was more suitable as GRP filler. It was found for days after around the galley. I never cooked rice again until I fould boil in the bag.

On another long distance cruise we were being careful with water, so some bright spark suggested boiling spagetti in seawater (without adding any salt) - it was inedible!

On the plus side I ended up cooking baked alaska on a coulpe of occasions so uit wasn't all bad!

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[moodycruiser]

When sailing from uk to med about 20yrs ago I worked out some basic menus using tinned mince and lots of spices depending on whether having pasta, rice or smash. I bought 4 cases of this darned mince, and on reflection should have tried it first ! It was bl**dy awful, even with chille, curry or whatever ! On arrival Costa del Sol I had 1 tin left. Put it in a glass fronted box with a toffee hammer attached, stuck it on a bulkhead and labelled it "In case of shark attack....."
Try before you buy.

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[moodycruiser]

When sailing from uk to med about 20yrs ago I worked out some basic menus using tinned mince and lots of spices depending on whether having pasta, rice or smash. I bought 4 cases of this darned mince, and on reflection should have tried it first ! It was bl**dy awful, even with chille, curry or whatever ! On arrival Costa del Sol I had 1 tin left. Put it in a glass fronted box with a toffee hammer attached, stuck it on a bulkhead and labelled it "In case of shark attack....."
Try before you buy.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[moodycruiser]

When sailing from uk to med about 20yrs ago I worked out some basic menus using tinned mince and lots of spices depending on whether having pasta, rice or smash. I bought 4 cases of this darned mince, and on reflection should have tried it first ! It was bl**dy awful, even with chille, curry or whatever ! On arrival Costa del Sol I had 1 tin left. Put it in a glass fronted box with a toffee hammer attached, stuck it on a bulkhead and labelled it "In case of shark attack....."
Try before you buy.

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