Her Landlord Wants Her To Cook For Him And His Pregnant Wife, But He Refuses To Lower Her Rent In Exchange For The Meals
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Imagine being a really good cook and really enjoying cooking. If you were a renter who shared a kitchen with your landlord, would you be willing to make extra food to share, or would you only make enough food for yourself?
In this story, one tenant is in this exact situation, and he is unwilling to share any of his food unless the landlord reduces his rent as compensation for the food. The landlord is unwilling to do that.
Out of spite, the tenant has decided to be a little extra when cooking to make the food even more tempting.
Let’s read all about it.
My landlord tried to demand I feed him
I moved into a basement unit with a shared kitchen with my landlord on Sept 1.
Basically I shared with my landlord and his pregnant wife some shrimp alfredo I made for dinner on my first night as a nice gesture, and the next time I cooked they tried to demand part of my meal and threatened to terminate the lease.
Cursed me out and acted like I was playing in their faces for eating a home cooked meal (oven roasted salmon and cilantro lime rice, a super simple meal really) without offering them some, because the pregnant wife thought she was entitled to my dinner.
I previously tried negotiating with them by offering to cook a meal a week in exchange for reduced rent, but after they laughed in my face for thinking they should compensate me if they want me to cook for them I got petty.
Let’s refer to the lease…
In my lease it states food is to be kept separate and I am responsible for feeding myself.
Their food is strictly off limits. And my food is off limits to them.
Fine by me.
All they eat is frozen burritos, hot pockets, ramen noodles etc.
OP is a really good cook.
I have almost a decade of fine dining restaurant cooking experience, and to spite them, I decided to make myself the most elaborate, aromatic, delicious meals.
Food is to be kept separate so as per my lease, legally there is nothing I can do.
So I first started with some red wine braised garlic short ribs and baked Mac n cheese from scratch. I cooked the ribs low and slow in the oven, and when I say they smelled glorious.
My landlords living room is connected to the kitchen (I live in the basement, so my unit connects to a door in the corner of the kitchen that leads to the basement) and he and preggo wife sat on their couch basically mean mugging me the entire time I cooked but they didn’t say anything.
OP expected the landlord to say something.
The whole house smelled divine for hours afterwards.
I cleaned up afterwards and took the leftovers downstairs to keep in my locked mini fridge and left not a trace in the kitchen except a delicious lingering smell.
I half expected a snooty text from my landlord while I was eating but they actually didn’t say or do anything that night.
The next day I made myself some hot honey fried chicken and while I got more silent glares out of the living room from both of them, the meal went by uneventfully.
He kept making delicious meals.
However, that weekend after I got home from work, I made myself some coconut curry chicken and saffron rice (really quick stovetop meal) and for the hell of it I got my blender out and made myself a mango lassi.
While I was mixing my drink, my landlord wandered into the kitchen and began digging around in various cabinets as I was cooking. Just opening and shutting drawers and moving stuff around randomly.
I waited til he went back into the living room, then I had to run back downstairs to grab my cardamom powder, and just because I had a hunch, I decided to come back up the stairs really quietly.
I hadn’t closed the door to the basement, so I just peeked around the doorway to see my pregnant landlord lifting the lid to the pot of curry.
He confronted her about it.
Of course I came storming in then to ask her what she thought she was doing, and she jumped and dropped the lid back onto the pot and turned and looked at me all sheepishly.
I asked her again what she thought she was doing and she just shrugged and said she didn’t think there was any harm in seeing what was “going on in her kitchen.”
Then she just turned around and penguin waddled out of the kitchen like she hadn’t just been trying to do something to my meal.
Her husband didn’t reappear either and I lowkey suspect he had told her the coast was clear when I ran downstairs.
OP tried not to leave the kitchen while cooking.
Anyway I realized I was going to have to be a bit more careful after that because these people are shameless.
Two days later, I decided to bake myself a fresh loaf of bread and oven roast a Cornish game hen with fresh rosemary and some delightfully aromatic garlic and truffle butter I’d gotten from work.
I made my bread dough and took it downstairs to rise for about 45 minutes, then came up and threw everything in the oven and made a point of sitting in the kitchen and reading while my food was cooking.
But the landlord wanted to use the oven.
And I was about an hour into baking, (and the house smelled divine) when the husband came into the kitchen, grabbed a frozen pizza out of the freezer and informed me that he would need the oven for his dinner.
Super rude but whatever.
I let him know that I was almost done with my meal, and to give me 20 minutes and the oven would be all his.
He huffed and puffed but went back into the living room and left the pizza on the counter.
He was trying to be considerate.
I finished cooking, cleaned up, took my meal downstairs and I left the oven on for him to cook his pizza.
About half an hour after I went downstairs, I received a snarky text from my landlord asking if I intended to burn down the house and kill his family because I had left the oven on.
These people smh.
I replied back that I was sorry, I had thought he was going to cook his frozen pizza so I’d left the oven on as a courtesy.
Apparently, they weren’t really worried about the oven.
He texted back pretty much immediately that it was really no big deal, it had just upset his wife and maybe I could make it up to her by giving her a piece of the bread I’d just baked.
At this point I’m pretty sure she put him up to it.
I told him sorry, that’s for my lunch tomorrow and again reinstated my offer to cook a meal a week for reduced rent.
He didn’t reply.
This is suspicious.
Then a few days after that, I was sitting in the kitchen reading while the French onion soup I was making for dinner simmered on the stove when I saw my landlord check his phone and then leave the living room and go upstairs into their part of the house.
Not 3 minutes later, the power in the kitchen shut off.
I’m pretty sure he had flipped off the breaker because none of the power in the rest of the house went out. But the stove, the kitchen light, and I’m guessing the power to the fridge cut off.
Of course the wife started freaking out. Came storming into the kitchen to demand why I had “burned out” their power.
OP finds this even more suspicious.
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Her husband came down the stairs after that, looking a little too calm. He said it was probably the breaker (duh) and then went back upstairs to see if he could fix it.
Power came back on a few minutes later. I finished making my soup and went back to the basement.
Almost immediately got a text from landlord saying that maybe I should take it easy in the kitchen because the “wiring is fragile.”
I didn’t even reply to that text.
OP has a different theory about what’s going on.
Nothing is wrong with the kitchen wiring or it would have glitched out on curry day, because I had the oven, stovetop, and blender all going at the same time that day and I was only using the stove top for the french onion soup.
It was definitely just another attempt to mess with me because I won’t give them my meals.
It’s definitely been a bit of a rollercoaster ride maliciously complying to the lease, but I’ve been eating deliciously the past couple of weeks, and there’s a small part of me that enjoys that it riles them up so much.
OP will be moving soon.
I only have about 5 more weeks on my lease and then I will be moving into a small studio apartment while I save for something better.
I’m almost to my goal amount, so by the new year hopefully my housing issues will be solved.
Also as far as anyone wondering about the meals, nothing I mentioned here really took more than about 20 minutes of prep time and maybe an hour or so of cooking time.
All of these meals are actually really simple and as I am only cooking for one, the small portions mean I only make enough for that meal and usually lunch the next day.
Part of the problem here is that the landlord’s wife is pregnant. Pregnancy hormones can make women a little extra picky, and cravings are no joke.
But the easy solution would be to reduce the rent in exchange for OP cooking for them once a week. They can’t really expect a tenant to cook for them for free.
Let’s see how Reddit responded.
Here’s an idea for revenge.
Another person suggests how OP should respond to the fragile wiring comment.
Here’s some advice.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man who finds his parking spot at a hocket game in jeopardy from a rude driver.
Here’s another comment about the kitchen wiring.
As OP said, the kitchen wiring is probably perfectly fine. The landlord is probably just trying to make up an excuse to get OP to stop cooking so much. All of the smells are probably making the pregnant wife a little crazy.
He’s going to be so much happier when he moves out.
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