Why do I love Temple of Elemental Evil, but didn't get into Baldur's Gate, at all? It can't just be the age of BG; both games are old. Might it be crafting? Voice acting? Combat mechanics? I don't see how the two games are that far apart.
It could be due in part to the fact that Village of Hommlet was my first D&D game ever, or I could just stop expecting myself to make sense.

Some other things:

TOEE has more character build options than BG; you get feats and attribute increases on some level ups, which are far more interesting than the weapon proficiencies of BG.

TOEE has turn based combat, while BG has real-time with pause combat. I find that BG combat combines the worst of turn based and real time combat while lacking both the rhythm of turn based and the fluidity of real time.

Try Baldurs Gate 2, it is much better in terms of character leveling and magic options, combat and such things.

Good points! I tried both, and even kept at it until pretty far in, hoping it would grab me, but they didnt.

Probably the combat and the rule sets. BG uses the old AD&D rules, while ToEE uses the 3.5 rules. And ToEE's turn based combat is absolutely stellar. BG's combat isn't nearly as good as ToEE, although I disagree with dtgreene's assessment of it combining the 'worst' of turn based and real time.

I personally love both games.

Well... I have bouth... and also played them, but the TOEE has so many bugs that at times it became unplayable. In addition, BG has a much better developed history and more charismatic NPCs.
that is my opinion.

It's a very hard thing to define. I for instance, am one the few which quite like pool of radiance (yep that one that deleted your hard drive), but then I rarely if ever play with a party. Same with BG, I tend to solo it, am just not a team player (dragon age too). Not sure if TOEE is soloable, haven't looked. There are other things, love BG, didn't like icewind dale as much, less story and more combat, and neverwinter story and part was just crap.
The point I am trying to make is that there are many many different factors which afect this. Another way of looking at it, do you like the gold box games? I did, even tried writing one back in qbasic era, but really can't play them now.
Anyways, try big world setup for baldurs gate (adds a tonnes of mods) and then solo it, becomes a lot more tactical, positioning, spell line up (for mages etc.).

Well, some work was done on icewind dale:
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/icewind-dale-gets-modded-to-the-temple-of-elemental-evil-beta-version-available-for-download/

Grab the TOEE editor and get going :o)
https://co8.org/community/index.php

Nope. 3.5 rules. Maybe you're thinking of Icewind Dale 2?

Yes, you are right. My memory is getting old :)

But, anyway, even if I preferred 3.0 over 3.5, TOEE is still one the best paper RPG translation and, as a consequence, one of the most balanced CRPG ever.

I'm a member of the TOEE crowd. I beat that one.

Being a translation of a TRPG, even a well known one, does not automatically make the game balanced.

For example:
* The tabletop game isn't even balanced to begin with. From what I hear, Clerics and Druids are overpowered compared to other classes.
* Apparently, in TOEE there is a special weapon that, if certain conditions are met, will always hit. This game implements the Power Attack feat, which gives you extra damage in exchange for accuracy. Combine the two, and now you can get extra damage for free. (Not to mention there is a way to get a lot of extra attacks with this weapon.)
* Some weapons, like the Glaive, allow you to attack at a longer range. While that might not seem too gamebreaking on its own, when you factor in the Attack of Opportunity mechanic (a mechanic I dislike for other reasons), you get free attacks on any enemy that is trying to close to melee, and *that* can be game-breaking. (For fans of the tabletop game, let me mention the Spiked Chain.)

I felt like TOE had a more options for you to play the way you wanted.

For example I did a playthrough where I beat the game as a solo level 2 or 3 rogue. Required a lot of reloading to get the ring of invisibility in the opening town IIRC.

ToEE is a pretty literal interpretation of the D&D ruleset at the time (though I prefer original edition AD&D or 2.0 rules to 3.5 myself) and also an adaptation of a famous D&D tabletop module. So ToEE, to me feels like playing table top D&D with the PC handling the dice rolls and limited dungeon mastering.

BG feels like playing a fantasy video game that just happens to be using D&D rules, but to me never really feels like the pen and paper game it's based on.

Even with the bugs I rate ToEE as one of the greatest RPG's ever made- especially as it has role playing choices based around your alignment that change how you deal with the Temple itself.