The kitchen goddess

Let's be honest... I'm really no more than functional in the kitchen. I can think of three people right off the top that are better in the kitchen than me (evil chef mom, noble pig and snooty primadona come to mind). I only know that because they've posted pictures of their glorious efforts and folks....I'm not there yet. 25 years of production dinners and I'm just now discovering things I like to cook. Not that I'm not good at it... but I haven't been perfecting my craft for 25 years, I've been cooking chickens in the crock pot and steaming broccoli. Hardly earth shattering. How ironic that I made the cooking website... I should have just called it comfort food galore!

Along the way, I've also made some whopping errors... otherwise known as being bit in the butt by the kitchen goddess. This odds of this bite happening are usually directly proportionate to the number of people available to witness the tragedy. Holidays are prime targets as is my dad! But that's because I started early...

• Like the first cake I made and I decided to make boxed frosting (back in the day). I got it too wet because I wanted to make sure I could spread it. To thicken it, I added flour. My dad suggested that I stick with peanut butter for a year or two until I got the hang of spreading things.
• Which brought on the peanut butter cookies I made when I forgot to add sugar. My dad kept saying "there's something wrong with these... what the !#&*% did you do?"

My poor dad, he's been the recipient of some dreadful attempts on my part.

• Like the time I made orange chicken in the crock pot. One word. Don't. It was so far beyond dreadful. I believe my husbands words were, "you picked a dinner with your folks to make the worst meal you've ever produced? why don't you do things like that when there's no one else around to witness it?"

Following that are the holiday events... very mundane, turkeys that didn't get done on time, hams that were cold in the middle. I swear I followed directions. I have no idea why I'm so capable at this now and 10 years ago it was hit and miss! Back to my dad....

We lived in a rental house that had an odd sized oven from which the previous renters had stolen the oven rack. I'd looked everywhere for a new one. I finally took my cooling racks and criss crossed them in the oven as a shelf and baked cookies. Worked great. So I invited my parents over for dinner and decided to make a pineapple upside down cake which my dad loves. You guessed it, that cake was a little heavier than the cookies, causing my little design to give way and I ended up scraping cake batter and pineapple off the inside of the oven.

At our last house, we remodeled the kitchen when we moved in, but we didn't add additional electricity. The kitchen only had two outlets. Which meant you were constantly juggling appliances and cords to plug things in. One outlet had the phone and the coffee maker. That left the outlet behind the cooktop (yup... you see it coming, don't you?) for everything else. I wasn't watching one day when I was setting up to make mashed potatoes. This is what the cord to my kitchen aid stand mixer has looked like ever since.

Yes, and that's my hair too which is always in the way of everything! Burned the cord up nicely, but it still works 6 years later!

This last one is one I'm happy that I don't have a picture of. Thanksgiving blueberry pie debacle. I had blueberry plants at the last house and they were loaded. TOG loves blueberry pie, so I made one. It came out of the oven looking beautiful! I set it on the back burner because I was out of counter space (this was a small kitchen) and was finishing dinner. I turned on the broccoli to steam and was mashing potatoes when the pie exploded. Glass pie pan, hot burner... the kitchen goddess turned on the wrong burner. I've got a turkey ready to carve, sweet potatoes to tend to and a steaming hot blueberry/glass splinter mess oozing down my walls and cupboards, into the bottom of my cook top. Glass and blueberries in the mashed potatoes, the gravy... and from the front room I hear... "what the hell did you do?" At that moment, I wanted to do murder!

See, I'm reliving the whole thing right now! I think it's true, that no matter how proficient we become, the kitchen goddess occasionally rises up and smacks us down, publicly! I try to carry a seed of humility, but sometimes I forget and suffer the consequences... like the half hour cookies that never got beyond dough in the Behemoth's predecessor. Waste of cookie dough! I did it two nights in a row, because the first one wasn't enough evidence!

Has the kitchen goddess ever visited you? Is there a blueberry pie episode in your past? Do tell!

Asthmagirl out!   

Comments

[Mental P Mama]

I keep things so simple here that even I can't screw it up! Unfortunately, I am starting to experiment these days which is not helping the ol' menopot.

[Linnea]

Everyone makes mistakes or bad choices that don't seem bad at the time, that is how we get better. I think you should give yourself credit for the things you do really well, for example (I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before) you make the best stuffing in the whole world. I loved your Waldorf salad and you have been baking mean cookies for as long as I can remember.

Most of my food comes out pretty yummy, however I have had a few that didn't come out how I thought they would. I made a disgusting crock pot chicken too, I think it was orange and lemon but I didn't realize you can overcook chicken in the crock pot. By the time my man got home from work it was soo icky. Then last Christmas we went to Colorado to visit the in laws and I had to work in seriously understocked kitchens, both staples and equipment. I knew they wouldn't have extra wide heavy duty foil to wrap my spring form pan so I wrapped it before I left home and took it in my luggage. Somewhere between Washington and Colorado that foil got a teeny tiny hole and my cheese cake came out with an unrecognizable, super soggy crust. I was sad, embarrassed, and angry at the crappy kitchens. We still ate the top and I learned that next time I'll be at the store buying everything else so I should just add foil to that list.

I keep laughing about your blueberry pie and it kind of reminds me of the time I set kindling on top of my wood stove to keep them away from my kid. For anyone reading this that is new to wood stoves as I was NEVER do that. Luckily we had a fire extinguisher near by.

Love Linnea

[evil chef mom]

Oh... the Kitchen Goddess, she's as fickle as her sister the Baking Goddess.

1. undercooked potato salad at my own baby shower, no less.

2. exploding pyrex dish. glass everywhere.

3. undercooked chicken... more than once.

4. undercooked lemon loaf. just this week.

5. too many others to count.

See, it's happened to us all. Now instead of crying, I blog about it.

[noble pig]

Oh you are so sweet and WRONG about yourself! You are a beautiful cook...I've seen your recipes my dear...and....everyone has screwed up in the kitchen.

Like when I made bread and left out the in-see bit of salt....YUCK...super YUCK!

The moroccaan chicken I made and simmered in lemons with skins...ugh so bitter.

Over-salting everything.

Oh god, my poor family...they have been through a lot with my kitchen disasters.

[Snooty Primadona]

Yup, I have to say that I've had more disasters with food than I can even count.

You're so sweet to mention me, but honestly I screw up in the kitchen ALOT. However, I like to keep my screw-ups limited to holidays, lol.

One year I couldn't find the giblets in a turkey, so I just cooked it with them in, lol. The turkey was a Butterball (which you can't screw up) and I screwed it up. It was dry and none of us wanted to eat it. Now, I make tenderloin because I know I can't screw that up. Or the time I tried to do crab cakes & the oil wasn't hot enough. They were like eating grease sponges.

I've got lots of stories, lol.

[Amy]

I won't clog up your comments with the full list, lol.....instead I'll give you my favorite comment EVER from a less-than-successful meal:

Me: This isn't very good, is it?
Mr. Asthma Mom: Well, it's.......nourishing.

[envetc@rogers.com]

the oven rack story cracked me up. I left home a hundred years ago and my mother gave me a wok and some advise.
Son: one pot, cooks everything from healthy stir fry to popcorn to grilled cheese if you position the bread right.
I used only a wok for 10 years, cooking for dinner parties of 10 or more, never had an oven or a desire to bake. I now have a few more luxuries, but the wok is still the best
Great post asthma girl!

[Amy]

Oh, don't mistake his intention...it's purely for entertainment value, never tact. :)

[Bob Cleveland]

WELL ... I be a guy, and married to one of the best cooks in the world. And thus I'd expect that the only really (and I mean REALLY) bad dinner she ever fixed was the fault of a recipe. It was Liver-Rice Casserole.

We love liver, and all the rest of the ingredients like rice, tomatoes, cabbage, and lots of other vegetables. It was artfully prepared and beautifully presented.

Did I mention awful?

That's been 49+ years and we laugh about it yet today.

[Flea]

Quite a few meals during which the Hunny has asked, "Can we order out?"

Oh, and I burned down someone else's kitchen. Does that count?

[Asthmagirl herself]

Ho ho ho!

Thanks all! I enjoyed your stories! Now I don't feel so bad about my own misadventures. But I will try to get pics of them for the blog!

[Tracy]

Too many to list. I screwed up country fried steak just tonight! Fun! Try cooking on a nightly basis for a professional chef. Talk about intimidating.

[Mrs. G.]

I once tripled a brownie recipe to make a bunch of them for a party. I forgot the flour, so we all had to eat them with a spoon.

[The Yummy Mummy Cooks Gourmet]

Bob has you beat with the liver casserole. You're doin' just fine...

Kim

[Baroness von Bloggenschtern]

I can tell you the latest kitchen debacle - the others, I try to blank out as soon as possible after the event...

I was roasting a hard-boiled egg for my Passover Seder plate, and I guess the egg got a little too hot inside, and blew out the end - all over the inside of my oven. Lovely smell, with guests due to arrive in 2 hours.

Thank God for fans and vinegar, and self-cleaning ovens!

[annbb]

I started giggling to myself at peanut butter cookies. Things only got worse from there. When I got the "the pie exploded", I completely lost it. I was laughing so hard my eyes were tearing. That was such a great post, Asthmagirl.

[Meg]

My oh my, it helps my "no cooking skills" self to read everyone's cooking mistakes.

I just opt out on the cooking altogether...

[foolery]

You have inspired me to blog about this, so I just cut my would-be answer and am headed off to write it up.

Hilarious post, AG, and I don't believe you for ONE MINUTE that you aren't a fabulous cook! Who was it who said that if you never have big disasters you're living WAY too safe and are therefore boring as hell? Oh wait, I'll claim it, why not?

Love,

Laurie