O/S disasters.... let us share...

HelenYorkshire

...as I was smiling at this thread, my lunch/dinner for tomorrow (sausages and a duck leg) were busy being cremated. I cannot smell the kitchen from here! I have also been reminded that should you accidentally turn on the wrong electric hob, the resulting smell is your salad spinner slowly melting and welding to it. Also, your soup will stay cold.

MaggieBaking

HelenYorkshire - Oh no!!! Hope it all cleans up ok, at least you didn't ruin your soup (or did I speak to soon?!)

I finished reading this thread today and laughed till I cried! I was reminded of another disaster I had a long time ago.

Back in the day I used to think I was being OS if I home-cooked something... but I used to get out a recipe book, decide what to eat and then buy all the ingredients each night I wanted to cook. (No carrying food over to another meal like the rest of the block of parmesan, and never would I keep leftovers :eek: ) Anyway, one day I decided that I fancied making duck spring rolls, got the ingredients and set to work.

I didn't quite realise how much effort was involved. Firstly, I bought a whole duck (just for spring rolls for 2! :eek:) which I had to boil it for a couple of hours, with herbs and spices. Of course I didn't have a pan big enough at the time so I kept having to turn the bird round putting the sticky-out-bit back into the water and so on...

Then I had to chop all the veg, into matchstick size pieces (leek, spring onion and cucumber I think?) and my knife skills weren't much cop back then. I painstakingly cut out all these bits, my boyfriend every now and then would ask if I was ok as I was a bit frazzled. "Are you sure those need chopping up so thin? Doesn't matter does it?" - it didn't as it was only him and me eating it but it mattered to me!

Duck almost ready (and looking disgusting I might add), I had to prepare the filo pastry to make the spring rolls. I'd never used this particular ingredient before so I got it out of the freezer and went to unravel my first piece,.... RIP.... It may occur to many of you that you need to defrost it before you use it but it didn't to me.... My boyfriend comes in to have a look, and tries himself and then gets shouting at for ripping it too.... Seeing the mad look in my eye, ever the gentlemen, he offered to go out and get some more as we agree the pack is obviously duff.

Of course, the second pack is also frozen and also comes apart. I did valiantly try and make weird shape spring rolls with the biggest bits of filo pastry I could muster but just looking at them all torn and mishapen after sweating and steaming in the kitchen for a couple of hours I didn't have the heart to cook them.

We had a KFC that night!

GreyQueen

When my Mum was a girl Grandma didn't want to be "bothered" by having a youngster underfoot whilst she was cooking or baking so didn't pass on her excellent skills. They were of the generation who married young and straight out of their parents' homes and into their own. Therefore, Mum as a young wife was a bit of a menace in the kitchen until she learned the ropes.

There were several disasters. There's one so vivid that I can almost see it happening although I was in the womb at the time;

Mum made up a mixture for currant buns but was in a bit of a rush so decided to tip it all into a cake tin, rather than fiddle about spooning it into bun cases. She put it in the oven and cooked it for tha same amount of time as small buns.

When she took the cake out the top had browned and settled so she thought it was cooked and turned it out onto a cooling rack. It went floooppp!!!! and fell right thru the grid.

In those first months there were so many culinary disasters which ended up being fed to next-door's chickens that, whenever Mum opened the back door, even if it was to peg washing out, the chooks ran up to the fence gabbling excitedly.

When they married, Dad was ever-so-slightly chubby having been well-fed on his mother's cooking and lost a bit of weight when he passed into my mother's tender culinary care............

Chaos_Monkey

I've just read most of this thread with tears in my eyes! Truly hilarious!

I think I've managed to forget some of mine, but I have 2 from the last few years...

Artisan Bread.....saw all the hype on this site about the 5min HM bread that doesn't need a BM, and decided I'd give it a go. Printed out the recipe, bought all the ingredients and was all set. I then proceeded to only half read the instructions (actually a common mistake I make - I wish I'd learn!) and instead of leaving the mixture out to 'prove' for 3hrs, I put it in the fridge for 3hrs. Realised my mistake, so left it in the kitchen for 3hrs in hopes of rescuing it, and carried on as per the recipe. Did my first 'batch' in the oven, it actually looked ok! Woohoo......Made DH and my sandwiches for the following day, and both of us could manage less than half - Turned out it was a bit 'heavy' and VERY salty! The rest of the dough was left in the fridge for about a week while I tried to work out how to fix it, until it went dry and a bit smelly, then it went in the bin! That was at least 2yrs ago now, and I'm going to give it another go now I'm not working and have more time, this time I'm going to read and measure carefully!!

FlapJacks.......first attempt turned out very soggy, we ate it out of the baking tray with spoons! Very tasty, just soggy!
Second attempt, in trying to remedy the above problem, they were rock hard. I couldn't get them out of the tray, and for some reason, I'd also lined the tray with baking paper.....so when I did eventually get them (it - it was solid!), I couldn't get the paper off. So I put the whole thing in the cupboard while I thought about the situation for a few days. Turns out very hard flapjack softens if left for a few days, so I cut it up....still couldn't get the paper off though, except in small shreds. Still ate most of it though, just carefully!

I have more, but really need to get off t'internet and make some tea...DH is due home in 30mins and I'm going to have to admit I've done naff all today if I don't get some washing up done!

Lazy_Liz

What a great laugh, thank you all for sharing your disasters.
I've made lots too but just now can only think of the BM, over the years I have used it I have at intervals forgotten one or the other ingredient ( forgettingthe yeast....now that really is a disaster, anyone need a brick?) although the worst mistake is not putting enough water in and getting a a crumbling mass of what looks like pebbles. Nervemind, the rooks love it.

peb

Bread making....... I had visitors staying and a reputation for good cooking - the friends usually send out for Chinese or go to the fish shop. I took a day off work and prepared curries for the first night (four plus rice plus naan plus chappatti which a friend had prepared and I just had to bake) and lasagne for the second night. When we set out for the days walking an sightsseing I put the ingreients in the breadmaker - including olives, sundried tomato etc telling my friends it was very easy to use. I forgot the water. When we came back the kitchen had a slightly smokey floury scent....... The lasagne was nice though!

RachelS

spike7451 wrote: »

Had one,well two actually... today...Did a chinese meal using a Uncle Bens sauce I bought reduced from the CoOp..Tasted bloody aweful THEN I thought I'd make my own Spring Rolls,so I bought the Filo Pastry & let it thaw out.Cooked the filling & allowed it to cool..
Made the Spring roll but in hindsight,the rolled Filo was too thick so even tho the outside was nice & crisp,the inside pastry was still raw! To top it all off,I went to the loo after chopping Chili & forgot..well,you can guess the rest!lol

Don't feel too bad about the spring rolls, Spike, my brother did that with the filo pastry last week and he's a professional chef! He was furious!

kings981

This reminds me of the time when me and my then boyfriend (now husband!) had just moved into together. We invited his parents for lunch - a hearty leek and potato soup and a roll. Trouble was 10 minutes before serving, I tried it, and realised my husband had used the wooden spoon I used for making soap the day before!! I didn't say anything and no one commented!!!! Now all kitchen equipment for non food related is stored no where near the kitchen!!

kings981

I was once trying to speed dry my jeans by putting them over the top of the rayburn - across the two liftup tops...fell asleep for 3 hours to find the house full of smoke and no backside left in my jeans...another lesson learnt.

Berni888

kings981 wrote: »

I was once trying to speed dry my jeans by putting them over the top of the rayburn - across the two liftup tops...fell asleep for 3 hours to find the house full of smoke and no backside left in my jeans...another lesson learnt.