Comments on: Too many cook(book)s in the kitchen

By: Chappysmom » Random Things

Chappysmom » Random Things — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 02:05:22 +0000

[...] winning things, Chris posted one of her many contest announcements the other day–this time, a chance to win a box full of cookbooks. Well, guess who won? Me! How cool is that? I guess having that annual Stollen Day ordeal has its [...]

By: Tiphanie

Tiphanie — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 05:50:58 +0000

Interesting contest! Here’s my story:

I’m originally from Virginia, and married a California boy, and that’s where we ended up– in the Golden State. My husband introduced me to regional cooking, including chilies. I learned about peppers from Anaheims to serranos to habaneros. However, at first I didn’t know anything about the heat scale, or why chilies are used only in certain dishes/cuisines.

Early in our marriage, I decided to experiment with cooking new dishes, and decided on making arrabiata from scratch. I boiled the noodles, then put together the sauce. I decided that some peppers would suffice for the sauce. So I threw in some nice-looking small orange peppers, dicing them and mixing them in with the rest of the recipe.

Dinnertime came, and we sat down to enjoy our meal. But before long, both of us were rushing around, fanning our mouths, trying to gulp down milk. My husband asked me WHAT I had put in the sauce. I told him about the peppers. That was my introduction to the dangers of using habaneros, and a lesson in the amount of hot peppers to use. What was worse, my husband had rubbed his eyes before he realized what was in the sauce, and his eyes, tongue, and hand were burning for a while.

That evening definitely spiced up our marriage. We can giggle about it now, though…

By: dale-harriet in WI

dale-harriet in WI — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 01:01:04 +0000

When I was about 9 my best friend in the world was Mary Spooner. I was (at age 9) Dale-Harriet GOLDISH. She lived with her mother and her Aunt Dorothy. One sunny day, we were at her house, and Dorothy called to say she’d be home for lunch. We instantly formed “The GOLD SPOON Cafe” and after wild expressions of delight at our own cleverness, we set the table in formal style, drew up a fancy menu (complete with Gold Spoon logo and only one item) and set to work.
We made “Scrambled Eggs Gold Spoon with Fresh Toast” (no, not “French”) and Tea. Remember, we were 9. Mary cut the bacon into pieces while I scrambled the eggs. We made the toast and cut it into little points and put a teabag in a cup.
When Dorothy got home, we ushered her to the breakfast nook and gave her the menu. She ordered the scrambled eggs. We hurried back into the kitchen, stirred the bacon into the eggs, poured water (uhm…cold…) into the cup and I cooked the eggs in butter. We arranged the eggs on the plate, surrounded them with toast points (“buttered” to the point of being downright greasy) and carried the food to Dorothy, serving it with a flair.
She ate all of the toast, most of the eggs (!) and drank the cup of tea, nevermind the teabag was still floating in it. Cold. She hurried back to work, and as we went to clean up we realized: you’re supposed to COOK bacon before putting it into scrambled eggs. Dorothy lived to a grand old age and never did mention that she ate raw bacon with her greasy toast and cold-water (un)tea. Gold Spoon Cafe: triumph for us, tragedy for her.

By: Shari

Shari — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:28:09 +0000

Tragedy:

I made mac n cheese one night and even the dog wouldn’t eat it.
Sniffed the sauce pan, turned her nose up, and walked slowly away.

By: Miriam

Miriam — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 18:40:27 +0000

Of course, I don’t NEED more cookbooks and have not enough space as it is, but I sure do love books.

My culinary epic failure was a lemon meringue pie. I have been baking since I was old enough to hold a knife on my own (8 years old) and pastry and deserts are my favorite. When I was 13 or 14, I decided to make a lemon meringue pie. I found a recipe, collected all the ingredients, even borrowing some eggs from my neighbors since we didn’t have enough. I worked really hard at it, and the meringue just WOULDN’T make stiff peaks! I decided to just finish it according to the instructions and call it good. I baked it and it came out looking like someone vomitted on it…. turns out I mixed up egg whites and yokes. DUH! I chucked the whole thing, and went in my room to cry. I swore off lemon meringue and still have never tried it again 12 years later.

By: Joan K

Joan K — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 03:39:54 +0000

I was very young, old enough to read and I had done some cooking. (I started cooking at the age of four, when my mother was confined to bed while pregnant. I was putting soup in pans and heating it, nothing very difficult. This was about 1960 – no microwaves.)

Anyways I was a little older than that but not very old and I decided to make baked custard. I mixed the ingredients and suddenly realized I’d goofed. I tasted the mixture to be sure and I discovered instead of 1/2 tsp of salt I’d put in 1/2 cup!!!! I got the amounts of sugar and salt confused. Ick! I threw it out and made a new batch correctly.

To this day that is my worst cooking goof. I’ve had mediocre meals but nothing that horrible.

By: Linda Olsen

Linda Olsen — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 22:57:10 +0000

One year when I was ten, my father had been out to sea for a two month voyage, that turned into eleven months. So for his homecoming, I made cherry tarts, and I even made the crust from scratch. They looked wonderful and smelled even better. Unfortunately, I forgot to pit the cherries. My poor Dad, ate three of the tarts, spitting out the pits and said that they were the best tarts he ever ate.

By: --Deb

--Deb — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 21:56:23 +0000

Ooh, easy. My annual marathon of Christmas Stollen.

See?
http://chappysmom.com/2005/12/09/lost-stollen-whatever/

(Really, I’ve posted about it every year, but that first post tells the story best! My father’s is so lucky I love him so much….)

By: Turtle

Turtle — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 15:53:39 +0000

When hubby and i married I had not eaten meat since age 5, he was a die hard irish boy…meat and potato. I was the 2nd grader who had a recipe box and did cook the evening meals, mom did the dishes once she got home from work. I cooked through college as well and one of my fav dishes was a tofu mushroom stroganoff. As a newlywed i made this one evening for hubby. He could not even pretend to like it and i think ended up ordering pizza. Lol, he jokingly said that if that was what tofu tasted like it was grounds for divorce. (of course this view has changed somewhat over the years but he feels that was the disaster meal of the century!)
I think a triumph would be when i used to teach scuba diving. One week we had a huge military event where i was contracted to take the guys off of an aircraft carrier out diving for 5 days. Each evening i would go home and start prepping our picnic lunch for the group for the following day. (my boss where i worked even gave me the week off and helped prep the goods) I did not feel like the meal was anything spectacular but good wholesome food. The guys who had been on board ship or who had not been home in a while for homecooked food loved it. It made it so worth the work.
I would love to receive some new cookbooks! When we moved 3 years ago from the islands everything was moved by weight and i had to give away nearly all my cookbooks.

By: 5elementknitr

5elementknitr — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 15:24:51 +0000

When I was about 9, my friend Aimee and I decided to make lunch for my dad who was working on the front pasture.

We didn’t know how to cook but decided to make a box of Kraft Mac and Cheese. When we finished and he came in to eat, we were just about in tears. For some reason, it came out like soup.

We forgot the step where you DRAIN the pasta! My dad is the best dad ever. To keep us from crying, he ate a serving. AND had seconds of this disgusting slop we’d made!

What a great guy