S/O Proud kitchen moments -- Kitchen disasters

[The TARDIS]

I once made the classic mistake of forgetting to remove the stuffing from the bag on Thanksgiving. I burned the turkey too. Oops.

[GreenHall]

I dumped The sugar container today...twice.  And this was after I placed a plastic bag on the just turned off burner...

...I warmed up leftovers for dinner, rather than risking any more mini-disasters.

[afbluebelle]

I don't know if it qualifies as a disaster, but I have... issues with eggs.


I am really good at cracking and separating the white from the yolk, even without the plastic helpers. However, I almost always accidentally end up throwing away the part that I was supposed to use in the recipe. I kill a lot of eggs in my pursuit of yummy food goodness.

[Diane AKA Traska]

Making pasta... I put the water on, get my sauce and spices set up and ready, open the pasta, a little while later I pick up the box by the wrong end.  ::Facepalm::  I managed to save most of it, but it was still the most annoying game of pick up sticks ever.

[Nora]

I do believe we had sandwiches and ointment for dinner that night.

That sounds sort of meme-like for all the days we've all had where everything just goes sideways.

"What's going on?", glancing around at zombies and rubble.

"Oh, not much. It's been one of those days."

Dusts off remains of the kitchen counter, "What's for dinner?"

"Sandwiches and ointment again."

I'm telling you, we looked like victims of a pepper spray attack that evening. Dh and I with puffy red eyes, the dog drooling unhappily from every orifice while he made unhappy noises ( it sounded earily like he was scolding us). Nothing tasted right for 3 days either. That was a lesson I only needed to learn once if I ever had one.

[KenveeB]

I don't know if it qualifies as a disaster, but I have... issues with eggs.


I am really good at cracking and separating the white from the yolk, even without the plastic helpers. However, I almost always accidentally end up throwing away the part that I was supposed to use in the recipe. I kill a lot of eggs in my pursuit of yummy food goodness.

That's why I always put yolks in one bowl and whites in another, and don't throw away the extra until I'm done with the whole recipe.

[White Dragon]

I currently have stiches in my foot and have to keep it elevated, so I can only observe the disaster 5 feet from me.

DD made some absolutely delicious Eggs Benedict for the family.
She wasn't hungry earlier so she waited for the second (and final) batch before serving herself.

She made a lovely plate of breakfast and got a tray to eat in front of the TV. (Yeah, we do that a lot.)
Picked up the tray to re-position it and the plate slipped off, flipping upside down while falling and dumping everything on the living room carpet.

My living room has a yellow, gooey splatter in the middle if it.
The two eggs and the yellow spray look like Big Bird had a toileting incident.
There is hollandaise sauce on the couch, the footstool and in a crime-scene worthy spray pattern all over the floor.

DH, DS and DD scrubbed it, but the yellow marks remain. They spray treated and it looks like they'll have to rent a carpet cleaner.

Anyone know how to get hollandaise sauce out of carpet?? 

So....follow up...

DH broke down and bought a carpet cleaner (big house, pets, kids...cheaper in the long run.)
He scrubbed the stains.
He pre-teated the stains.
Moved the furniture so he could clean the carpet. Found more stains.
Lather, rinse and repeat. 
I put a different cleaner down.
I scrubbed the stains.
I soaked the stains.
DH used the machine.
We used a third kind of cleaner.
DH used machine (lather, rinse, repeat).

My carpet still seems to be vaguely yellow.

New house rule - no Hollandaise in the living room!!!!

[Dazi]

I'm actually a pretty good cook and generally a gook baker, but I've had a few baking disasters that come to mind.

1.  Still not sure what happened, but the day before Thanksgiving I had to clean the oven.  I was making pumpkin pies and much of the contents cooked over the pie edge and onto the heating element.  Surprisingly, the pies were Delicious, the resulting mess was not.  I always make sure to put a baking sheet under them now, but it's never happened again.

2.  Chocolate chip cookies that turned into cookie sheet cake.  Still tasted pretty darn good though they looked funny.

Now, I'm telling on some friends...

1.  1/2 tsp of cream of tarter is not 2 tablespoons...made great hockey pucks.
2.  When making your own homemade cream cheese frosting, you cannot use regular granulated sugar for powdered sugar...well, you can, but you need to thoroughly run it through a food processor first.  I don't know how to adequately describe it...it was sticky and grainy and weird.
3.  You have to cook chicpeas prior to making it into hummus.
4.  Do not add salt or tomatoes to beans until they are cooked well, otherwise they become impenetrable to water and remain rock hard.
5.  Don't substitute Cayenne pepper for paprika.  I was the only one who that it was great, everyone else was fighting over the milk.
6.  Buttermilk does not mean milk in butter (I've known several who've done this).  If you do need a substitute for buttermilk, you can pat a tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice in a cup and add milk to equal 1 cup, let sit for 5 minutes and use as directed.

[iridaceae]

Years ago I was making tacos and only realized after the fact that I had bought chicken fajita seasoning instead. I thought well, how bad can it be?  Really,  really bad. I tossed all of it.

★************

I am told that my mother- a Finn who emigrated to the US after marrying dad - boiled corn on the cob for hours the first time she cooked it ; she had never seen corn on the cob before.

[starofwinter]

I'm usually a decent enough chef, but I'm also incredibly easily distracted. I also like to feed begging animals scraps. This combination resulted in me one night absentmindedly adding the freshly chopped chilly to a hot wok containing only oil and copious amounts of garlic, thereby napalming the everloving Beezus out of myself and the dog. Seriously, a huge cloud rose like a phoenix from the wok, and all my mind did was go "bad move, Nora" before going uselessly and utterly blank. Then the burning started. Dh came running to see what the screams where about and encountered the dog blindly running into walls trying to get out of the kitchen, with me chanting "stupid, stupid, stupid" with my face under the tap, and while he's standing there wondering what we're carrying on about the cloud reaches the doorway.

I do believe we had sandwiches and ointment for dinner that night.

This reminded me of the time my mom tried to make buffalo sauce for my birthday dinner.  No one knows quite what went wrong, but it ended up with the cat in her carrier in the (fenced) backyard while we went to a movie for the next few hours.

[Baby Snakes]

Many moons ago when my DH and I were first dating, I invited him over to my apartment for dinner and I decided to make a Shepherd's Pie using my mother's recipe.  Well, he arrived for dinner and I proudly put my casserole dish on the table.  He takes one look at it and says "mashed potatos?"  I told him to dig in and when he saw the meat underneath, he called it Potato Surprise.  To this day, Shepherd's Pie is called Pototo Surprise in our house.

[Shalamar]

I don't quite understand, Baby Snakes - what was disastrous about your Shephard's Pie?

[Baby Snakes]

I don't quite understand, Baby Snakes - what was disastrous about your Shephard's Pie?

Actually I was quite pleased with how well my Shepherd's Pie turned out, but had never heard it referred to as "potato surprise"

[Miss Tickle]

The first time I tried to stir fry something I did it wrong. Very wrong.  I hadn't tried "frying" so I mixed up deep fry and stir fry. I added about three inches of oil to a Teflon wok and turned it up high. I popped the lid on so it would heat up faster.

I gathered up the ingredients and moved back over to the stove, then lifted the lid. Lucky I pointed it away, or I probably still be missing my eyebrows. I put the lid back on and we (of course there was a witness) took the pot outside to cool off. When I poured off the oil the Teflon went with it. Other than a few scorchmarks we got off easy, we could have burned down the house.

In an epic moment of one-up-manship, the next week (or so, not that long) my MIL ran out to show a house and left a pot on the stove.  Upon her return and discovery, she decided to do what we did, (move the pot) rather than what we should have done (nothing) and poured molten metal all over her kitchen and family room causing tens of thousands of dollars in damage.


The year we had take out Indian for Xmas was good. Invited my Mother over for dinner and spent the day preparing a beautiful stuffed leg of lamb.  It's faster than turkey, and we eat late, so I was planning on popping in the oven about 5:30 with sides to follow.  After preheating the oven I opened the door, reached in with my bare hands, grabbed the oven rack, and pulled it out. Even though it's been twenty years I still remember my exact thought at that moment.  Hm, that should have really hurt.

But no, in an heroic effort to save me from my own stupidity, my noble oven blew itself up to protect me. On Xmas eve, at 5 p.m. Since I didn't know how long I would be ovenless, my Mother took the roast home with her.  She told me it was delicious.

[Thipu1]

I don't quite understand, Baby Snakes - what was disastrous about your Shephard's Pie?

Actually I was quite pleased with how well my Shepherd's Pie turned out, but had never heard it referred to as "potato surprise"

I'm just surprised he didn't know what Shepherd's Pie is.  It's one of the UK's great gifts to humanity. 

BTW, a local restaurant makes a variation that tops the casserole with Mac and cheese instead of potatoes.  You'd be surprised how much lighter it males the dish.