Woman asks how to tell her husband his cooking is "unacceptable"—and the internet has answers

In the high-stakes world of professional kitchens, plating is everything. But in the slightly lower-stakes world of a Tuesday night dinner at home, standards can sometimes slip—leading one Reddit user to seek “professional advice” on how to handle a culinary crime committed by her husband.

Close-up of a traditional Turkish cuisine dish, Tarhana soup. A spoon full of soup. A vitamin-rich Anatolian winter soup. Cold and flu soup.

The post, shared on the subreddit r/KitchenConfidential (a community for professional cooks), features a photo of a seemingly innocent bowl of potato soup. The offense? A garnish of chopped chives that includes one impressively long, uncut spear floating ominously at the edge of the bowl. The caption simply reads: “Husband made dinner. How do I tell him this is unacceptable?”

The “Unacceptable” Garnish

The photo shows a creamy soup topped with cheese and chives, but the visual gag is undeniable: while most of the chives are chopped, one rogue, uncut stalk spans nearly the entire radius of the bowl. It’s a minor detail, but for a community of chefs who obsess over knife skills, it was an invitation to roast the husband with the kind of specific, over-the-top critiques you’d hear on The Bear.

The Internet’s “Helpful” Advice

The comments section immediately understood the assignment, offering solutions ranging from Gordon Ramsay-style meltdowns to surrealist performance art. User fujiesque suggested channeling every angry head chef in history, advising the wife to simply “Throw the bowl on the ground and tell him to clean up the mess.”

The aviation comparisons were inevitable. Spotting the runway-sized garnish, user Egg Toss suggested a passive-aggressive art project: send him a photo captioned “crudely drawn planes crashing into chives,” with the caption “See you tomorrow, chef.” Others leaned into the toddler vibes, simply offering the classic feeding line, “Here comes the airplane!”

For those preferring the “Idiot Sandwich” method, user Own_Magician_7554 suggested the ultimate Ramsay tribute: “Look at him with love and speak to him softly as you place a slice of bread on each side of his head….” Perhaps the most useful advice came from user steal_wool, who offered the single word that every chef uses to excuse sloppy plating, “Rustic.” While the original poster was joking, the thread serves as a hilarious reminder that whether you’re a trained Michelin-star chef or just a husband trying to help out with dinner, the internet is always watching your knife work.