Tastes Like Feet!: Your Kitchen Disasters

[TWP]

Ahhh, the time as a child when I made brownies and used a half cup of baking soda rather than a half teaspoon.  Yes, it was still chocolate, so of course we still ate them....but they were SALTY and BIG!  Whoooo.

[Mya Stone]

I just set my oven on fire. I was making homemade chicken nuggets (recipe on the bisquick box) and followed it exactly. It said to line a cookie sheet with foil and spray with nonstick spray, then drizzle melted butter over the chicken.

Did I use a cookie sheet with a lip? Nope. Don't own one. Guess what I'm buying tomorrow?

[bosawks]

I cooked some macaroons right after I made some garlic bread. The egg whites completely sucked up the flavor of garlic.

They were so bad that I threw them in the woods for the critters and they wouldn't even touch them.

[joanne3482]

Did I use a cookie sheet with a lip? Nope. Don't own one. Guess what I'm buying tomorrow?

 

You can fold the foil up to create a little lip around the edge. It's usually best to double it over. I cook chicken and potatoes in the same 9x13 pan by using foil to create two "separate" pans and that's how I do it. 

[BatmanBeatles]

I once ruined a glass casserole dish when I left it on the stove and I turned on the wrong burner by mistake. It exploded and glass flew everywhere. I still find pieces of glass under the fridge when i sweep.

[Uncle Benzene]

I once ruined a glass casserole dish when I left it on the stove and I turned on the wrong burner by mistake. It exploded and glass flew everywhere. I still find pieces of glass under the fridge when i sweep.

 

Oof. I've done that several times via the ole "hot dish, cold liquid" hazard. Once it was cold gravy straight from the fridge poured over leftover turkey that had already been reheated in the oven. Lost a perfectly good 9x9 Pyrex. And I can't even tell you how many coffee carafes I've lost while rinsing them under cold tap water. You'd think that once you've experienced that once... but nooooo, not for this guy. I'm sure one of these days the lesson will stick. Heh.

[LuckyBitch]

Back on Page one, I posted about my one and only kitchen fire:

 

Damn, that sucks, @Bella . If it makes you feel better I can tell you about the time I was heating up something for my kid in the toaster oven, it went up in flames, and I almost set the whole kitchen on fire. My one and only kitchen fire ever. A couple of years later, the kid is still mocking me for my stupidity but I blame Trader Joe's for a flaw in their directions. 

 

Well, tonight Mr. LB decided to match me. We were making a dinner I posted about in the What's for Dinner thread. While the ribs and the broccoli were in the oven, I stepped away for a few minutes to finish up some emails and I asked him to toast the sesame seeds we would need for the broccoli. I even said, "Just throw a couple of tablespoons in the cast iron skillet and heat them quickly for 30 to 60 seconds." 

 

He obviously paid no attention to what I said after I asked him to "toast" the sesame seeds. Next thing I know, an "Oh, shit!!!" is emanating from the kitchen. I look up from my laptop in the family room and see him walking towards the sink with flames shooting up at least a couple of feet. As he put the flaming pan in the sink, the flames shot up and looked like they hit the bottom of the kitchen cabinet, but thankfully they didn't, (lucky for him, ha ha).

 

Having not heard, or bothered to listen to what I said about toasting the sesame seeds in the cast iron skillet on the stove, he just heard "toast" and placed them on the small pan in the toaster oven, and hit the toast button. He says he left them in there for a few minutes and then noticed they were on fire, (duh).

 

Fun, fun, fun. The kid thinks it was a much more spectacular fire than the one I caused a couple of years ago. So, the benefit here for me is that he will now be mocking Mr. LB's kitchen fire instead of me and my kitchen fire. 

 

(Btw, Mr. LB is a very good cook, much better than I am. He just doesn't listen very well. After almost 20 years together, I've given up working on it and have just accepted it. He's lucky he's almost perfect in every other way.)

[harrie]

Oy, LuckyB, it's like sesame seed flambe. .  

 

I made a fire in the full oven many years ago but =haven't repeated the performance (so far; you never know).  It's easier to do than you'd think. 

[LuckyBitch]

Ha, harrie, sesame seed flambe. Yes, that's what it looked like.

 

Until a coupe of years ago, I had never had a kitchen fire and I do a lot of cooking. Also, last night was my husband's first kitchen fire and he's been cooking a lot for many, many years. 

 

I'm just thankful he didn't leave the kitchen while the sesame seeds were in the toaster oven because he does that frequently and I always tell him how foolish it is to leave the kitchen when he has something on the stove. He's been known to let things boil over and make a huge mess. I hate when that happens.

[janestclair]

I made a fire in the full oven many years ago but =haven't repeated the performance (so far; you never know).  It's easier to do than you'd think. 

 

Indeed it is. Especially when someone in your house decides to store the pot holders IN the oven and you turn on said oven to preheat without opening it (because who expects there to be pot holders in it?) and thereby set them on fire. 

 

That happened to me yesterday.  Fun times.   It took at least 2 hours for the smoke smell to go away, and that was with every window in the house open. 

[joanne3482]

Especially when someone in your house decides to store the pot holders IN the oven and you turn on said oven to preheat without opening it (because who expects there to be pot holders in it?) and thereby set them on fire.

 

That almost happened to me at someone else's house. I was heating up the oven to bake some chicken breasts for them and didn't know they store 2 pans and a couple towels in the oven. Who stores things in ovens?! (People who don't cook in them I suppose) 

[Athena]

That almost happened to me at someone else's house. I was heating up the oven to bake some chicken breasts for them and didn't know they store 2 pans and a couple towels in the oven. Who stores things in ovens?! (People who don't cook in them I suppose) 

 

Years ago, my family and I rented a house where the oven either didn't work or was really bad so people would put pots and pans in there. It's a good storage area if you have a small kitchen.

[LuckyBitch]

Wow, that reminds me of something from a long, long time ago. When I was in high school and babysitting, I heated up the oven to make the kids something for dinner. I think it was a casserole their mom had left for me to bake. Too bad she didn't tell me about the oven. I turned it on to preheat it and we soon smelled something awful. Well, of all things to store in an oven, she had a huge Tupperware bowl in there! It melted all over the rack and I spent the evening chipping the plastic off of it while I was freezing from having to open all the windows to let out the smoke. Fun times.

[grisgris]

Once I hosted a party and made pumpkin cheesecake squares. I'd made them before and they were always well-received. I noticed during the evening that they were literally untouched. I was curious, so I tasted one and it was terrible -- very bitter. I then figured out that I'd left out the sugar. I quickly whisked them off the table.

 

Another time, I made some dessert type dish and accidentally put in an entire tablespoon of cream of tartar instead of the 1/8 teaspoon the recipe called for.  Lesson: Do not sip on wine whilst cooking!

 

A few years ago, I wanted to make a surprise dessert for my boyfriend at the time. He loved anything with oatmeal in it, so I tried a recipe from a not-to-be-mentioned Food Network hostess. (You'll probably be able to guess.) The recipe called for making the cookies from a box of chocolate cake mix. I followed the directions carefully and when I baked them, the cookies all spread out way too much and ran together. I thought that I could salvage the mess into some type of cake, so I transferred it to a 9" x 13" baking pan. I put it back in the oven and baked it. Two hours later, it was not done. So, I kept going at 30-minute intervals and just gave up. My BF, who'd eat anything, even turned that down and we tossed it down the disposal. I can't figure out what went wrong, but since I don't plan on making that recipe ever again, I really don't care!

[KnoxForPres]

I guess it doesn't qualify as a disaster but it has created a go to quote for me.

Back when I was younger the Food Network was taking off and I had always loved cooking. I fell in love with Emeril and my parents bought me a cookbook. I made his chicken and dumplings.

It said to cover the cover the whole chicken until it had (guessing) a 1/2 inch over it. Well I was a kid and didn't think of buoyancy and filled a huge pot with water. The chicken floated so I kept pouring water. In hindsight I'm guessing quarts overage. And I know he gets some bad press, but Emerils recipes aren't that easy in general so I forged ahead.

End result was a very expensive and outrageously time involved experiment. It tasted like really bad water. But my dad, God love him, said "I think I detect the jalapeño". That is the quote that lives on to this day. I can't tell you how many times we have had something shitty or go to a bad restaurant someone will go "I think I detect the jalapeño".

Edited September 1, 2014 by KnoxForPres

[Blergh]

Once I attempted to fry chicken but wound up with a bunch of birds coated in with nothing but grease -and every morsel of batter caked at the bottom of the fryer. Oh,yeah, the fryer  had to be pitched  along with the chicken and it was an heirloom to boot.

[mansonlamps]

Mmmmm fried chicken. Done right, it's one of the most amazing foods in the world.

[Bastet]

I did that [forgot about a boiling pot] with either simple syrup or hummingbird food -- I don't remember which specific sugar and water combination it was, but one of those.  By the time I remembered I had it on the stove, the water was completely gone, the sugar was completely oxidized, and my pot was completely screwed.

 

Quoting myself to say, you guys, I just did this AGAIN.  Now we know the answer to "Who the hell could do that twice in one lifetime (let alone twice in about ten years)?" is, apparently, me. 

 

Put on sugar water for the hummingbird feeder, went outside to review the sunlight/watering needs of some plants I bought in order to figure out their best placement, went in my game room (attached to my detached garage, and thus sitting at the other end of the backyard) to make a drink, turned on the Cold Case marathon, got up half an hour or so later to get something from the kitchen, walked in the house and thought not, "Oh no! I forgot the sugar water," but instead, "What is that smell?" and finally, as I approached the smoke-filled kitchen, realized what was happening.

 

What an idiot.  The smoke was fairly well confined to the kitchen (and the smoke detectors are at the other end of the house), but the whole damn house smells like burnt sugar.  Good thing I have a lot of windows, as they'll all be open overnight.

 

I'm one of those people who is both "book smart" and in possession of common sense, but from this thread one would think I shouldn't be able to live independently.

[StatisticalOutlier]

I once ruined a glass casserole dish when I left it on the stove and I turned on the wrong burner by mistake. It exploded and glass flew everywhere.

 

I did it on purpose back when I was in college. Well, I didn't ruin it on purpose, but I did it on purpose.  I had a clear pyrex bowl with lid, and I was cooking rice and congratulating myself on my cleverness because if you use a clear pot because you can monitor the condition of the rice without removing the lid.  Same result--it exploded and glass flew everywhere.  Sure didn't expect that to happen, and I'm glad I wasn't in mid-monitoring.

[stillshimpy]

Oh boy, okay so here's the background:  About a year ago I was watching an instructional video on You Tube, in Spanish, filmed by a woman in Mexico, demonstrating a yogurt mold.  I was actually not interested in making it, I just sometimes sit around watching videos in Spanish in a (mostly failed) attempt to try and revive my mostly forgotten Spanish.  

 

At one point the woman is demonstrating scraping out a container of strawberry yogurt and she proceeds to do this multiple times.  Just making sure she gets every last speck of it and I caught myself the second after this happened, but I did have a moment of "Geez, I think you got it all.  Come on already, would you?"  and in the second afterward was so horrified by my own thought process -- being impatient with someone who had put up an instructional video, free of cost to me, trying hard not to waste any food in a country with far fewer privileges than I was born into.   Basically I was "first world problem" ing to a gross degree and was appalled by myself, so I decided to make every effort to not waste food going forward (<----disaster, ho!) 

 

Now, I have a Vitamix and like a lot of people who have one, I make nut butter in it.  Love the thing, best purchase ever, and I make sure to use it for as much as I can because it was a high cost item.  Nut butters are hell to clean out of Vitamix blenders , but I have discovered a couple of ways to make it easier.  I make baked take along oatmeal breakfast for my husband regularly and it includes some nut butter, bananas , blah blah, I make the nut butter first, then immediately make the oatmeal mix which also includes flax seed and has to be made in the Vitamix anyway.  End result, I waste less nut butter.  Go team.  

 

But I don't make those as frequently as I tend to make either peanut butter, or almond butter.  To sum up here? Oh God, did I make the worst smoothie in the world today.  I've made peanut butter, then used half a frozen banana and a cup of plain Kefir to make a breakfast smoothie that's high on protein, probiotic, good for workouts.  Go team.   

Today I was making almond butter and figured the same approach would work, but then for once in my life, I didn't have any frozen bananas in the fridge.  However, mangoes have sort of a similar, buttery kind of thing going on when blended.  

 

Oh my God, it was the worst taste combination you can imagine.  Like something they'd force you to drink at the radiologist's prior to a scan, where you can't help but think "Oh ugh, this is food product-like, but only like food in the prison system when you've done something really bad."   

 

Rather than accept, "Well that was a friggin' mistake, I'll know better next time.  Stick with peanut butter and banana."  Nooooo....I attempted to remedy this unpalatable mess.  I threw in two frozen cherries.  Wow, that actually managed to make it worse and that gritty thing from the radiology comparison was somehow accentuated the grittiness by upping the sweetness.  

 

So this where I lost my fool mind and put in a cup of spinach.  The results were unspeakably bad, but I'm still punishing myself for my stance of privilege  and impatience, so I don't want to give up.  I add matcha powder, because if it can't be good, by gum, it can be super healthy.  On this theory, I add a piece of raw ginger.  

 

At the end of all this, I am holding my nose to gulp this swill down and I am here to tell you: That? Was gross.  

 

Nothing went to waste, I suppose, so ...Go team and all that, but ...yuck.  

 

Then I had to finish cleaning the blender, which after making nut butters, I always add a little bit of vinegar to the water that is then agitated on high and holy crow, was a great big whiff of vinegar ever NOT the thing to add to today's chemical misfires.  

 

Ugh.  

Edited October 16, 2014 by stillshimpy

[Bella]

 

So this where I lost my fool mind and put in a cup of spinach.

 

And this is where I burst out laughing!

 

Sorry about the disaster, but I admire both your persistence and your ability to tell a story about yourself.

[stillshimpy]

Thanks, Bella.  Weirdly enough, raw spinach usually goes really well in smoothies.  It was the almond butter that just doomed that smoothie and every time I tried to compensate for the weird texture, I just made it grosser. 

 

Today I made some sauteed Kale that made the entire house smell like sulfurous vegetables.  It just must be my week for kitchen misfires, because it was really not all that great either.   So now I'm baking pumpkin muffins to try and drive the Kale smell out.  

 

Thank goodness it's working.  

[mlp]

That was hilarious stillshimpy.  Every time you tried to fix it, you made it worse.  LOL  I'm still laughing.  Thanks for telling us about it.

[HalcyonDays]

Cooking up bone-in skinless chicken breasts for my dog. I mix dry and wet food for her, and as weird as it sounds, buying "human" meat from the store (on sale!) and cooking it up is a hellva lot cheaper than buying canned wet dog food. So much cheaper. And so much better for her.

 

Anyway...so I have the chicken breasts simmering away on low heat for like 10 minutes-ish at this point. Then I realize I have to take the dog out and completely forgot about what's on the stove.

 

I come back to the house smelling like rancid burned death and a pot on the stove with half an inch of black tar-like ash in the bottom. No chicken breasts, mind you. No bones either. Everything literally cooked down and disintegrated into a thin yet almost solid layer of black tar that coated the bottom of my pot. Pot goes outside (and stinks up the outside), all windows opened and I swear, the smell did not leave the house for two weeks. No matter how many times the curtains and everything was washed, the house Febreezed with a total of four full bottles, etc, it STUNK. And I had to throw out my pot (I loved that pot). :'(

 

Thank god I didn't burn down the house though....But still...Didn't know you could do that to a BONE-IN chicken breast...

[stillshimpy]

Happy Crematorium, HalcyonDays!  Sorry about the lost pot and I feel your pain, truly.  

 

So, from the time I baked an insulated oven-mitt that I didn't realize was in an oven I put on to preheat for baguettes ...you know, where you are supposed to let your oven preheat for a nice, long time at the highest temperature possible...whee....and then went outside to do yard chores as some dough lost its chill on the counter and my home slowly filled with a stench I thought would cause us to condemn it, I present the cure for the worst stink.  That stink when you think it would be easier to burn the joint for insurance money, or sell the place in a fire sale, this will help tremendously. 

 

Mulled Cider in the crockpot.  For those times when you wish smell had never been invented, this will make you like your nose again.  Plus, you can put rum in the resulting cider, which doesn't suck either.  Unless you hate all these smells, in which case, I have no good advice other than you might want to just drink the rum. 

Edited November 7, 2014 by stillshimpy

[HalcyonDays]

Happy Crematorium, HalcyonDays!  Sorry about the lost pot and I feel your pain, truly.  

 

So, from the time I baked an insulated oven-mitt that I didn't realize was in an oven I put on to preheat for baguettes ...you know, where you are supposed to let your oven preheat for a nice, long time at the highest temperature possible...whee....and then went outside to do yard chores as some dough lost its chill on the counter and my home slowly filled with a stench I thought would cause us to condemn it, I present the cure for the worst stink.  That stink when you think it would be easier to burn the joint for insurance money, or sell the place in a fire sale, this will help tremendously. 

 

Mulled Cider in the crockpot.  For those times when you wish smell had never been invented, this will make you like your nose again.  Plus, you can put rum in the resulting cider, which doesn't suck either.  Unless you hate all these smells, in which case, I have no good advice other than you might want to just drink the rum. 

 

Thanks stillshimpy! I know - that pot was part of a nice Lagostina set - it was such a good one. Ah well. I feel your pain too..

 

Burned Ovenmitts for dinner! Woohoo!

 

The mulled cider sounds like a great idea - or even chilled cider with a shot of rum - I think we both would have needed that after our flaming disasters!

[backformore]

When I was a kid, my mom had a whistling tea kettle.  when the water boils, there is a shrill, unmistakable sound that you KNOW means it's time for tea.  

I don't drink tea a lot at home.  But sometimes I want a cup of tea, instant hot chocolate, or for some reason need to boil water in a kettle.  I can cook a lot of stuff, I should be able to boil water, right?   

Two problems -  one is that I'm absent-minded.  the other is that kettles I buy don't have the loud shrill whistle.   They just make a sound that sounds like the furnace or water heater  is starting up, or someone has the radio on upstairs, and I ignore it.   I put water on for tea, then I forget that I wanted tea, and go do something else.   It's not until I go investigate "what IS that smell?"   that I realize I've burnt ANOTHER tea kettle.  

 

I wish there was a way to sound-check a kettle at the store to make sure I get one with that ear-piercing whistle -  so I know the kettle will last me forever. 

 

Meanwhile, I boil water in a pyrex cup in the microwave. 

[HalcyonDays]

When I was a kid, my mom had a whistling tea kettle.  when the water boils, there is a shrill, unmistakable sound that you KNOW means it's time for tea.  

I don't drink tea a lot at home.  But sometimes I want a cup of tea, instant hot chocolate, or for some reason need to boil water in a kettle.  I can cook a lot of stuff, I should be able to boil water, right?   

Two problems -  one is that I'm absent-minded.  the other is that kettles I buy don't have the loud shrill whistle.   They just make a sound that sounds like the furnace or water heater  is starting up, or someone has the radio on upstairs, and I ignore it.   I put water on for tea, then I forget that I wanted tea, and go do something else.   It's not until I go investigate "what IS that smell?"   that I realize I've burnt ANOTHER tea kettle.  

 

I wish there was a way to sound-check a kettle at the store to make sure I get one with that ear-piercing whistle -  so I know the kettle will last me forever. 

 

Meanwhile, I boil water in a pyrex cup in the microwave. 

 

backformore, why don't you buy yourself an electric kettle? They boil water really fast, and it automatically shut offs about 10 seconds after the water comes to a boil, so that you can't overboil or boil away the water, or burn the kettle at all. I have one, and if you just boil say one cup or so of water, it gets it boiling in like 30 seconds. Really fast.

[Mountainair]

HalcyonDays

Your post intrigued me. I have a dog and cat and they both get wet food and dry foot. The dog is easier to ration so 8 pouches of wet food will easily last me two weeks. The cat on the other hand wants an entire pouch or can of wet food anytime I open the back door. That adds up! She's an outside cat for the most part and 14 years old. I know the dry stuff probably hurts her teeth so I'd be interested to know how you make your dog food and if it's something also suitable for a cat?

[HalcyonDays]

HalcyonDays

Your post intrigued me. I have a dog and cat and they both get wet food and dry foot. The dog is easier to ration so 8 pouches of wet food will easily last me two weeks. The cat on the other hand wants an entire pouch or can of wet food anytime I open the back door. That adds up! She's an outside cat for the most part and 14 years old. I know the dry stuff probably hurts her teeth so I'd be interested to know how you make your dog food and if it's something also suitable for a cat?

 

I have a German Shepherd, btw, so dog size comes into play here. The dry food is a high quality kibble. The "wet" is basically just boiled or pan fried chicken or steak that I cut up into small pieces and mix with the wet food. When I cook up the meat, I'll throw in a little bit of water and make "gravy" for the meal. The can of dog food cost almost $5.00 (the type she'll eat) and I get 2.5 meals out of it (she gets two meals a day), and I can buy much more "human" meat (on sale) for close to the same price, it was a no-brainer.

 

So I am not making dog food really. The canned food I used to buy was basically pure meat - no veggies in it, because my dog hates veggies. I sometimes cook up minute rice and mix that in also for my doggie.

[Mountainair]

Thanks! I have a 15 pound jack Russell so yea, a little bit of a weight difference there. I'm all about making my own stuff so you have helped me decide to look into this idea further!

[HalcyonDays]

Thanks! I have a 15 pound jack Russell so yea, a little bit of a weight difference there. I'm all about making my own stuff so you have helped me decide to look into this idea further!

 

You could also cook up a larger batch, then freeze the cooked meat, and thaw it out over a week. I mean, to boil up some chicken breast, shred and/or chop it up, and mix it with kibble is really easy to do. And it's not that substandard store bought canned food, where you are basically paying for water and fillers!

[Bastet]

Cats have rather different dietary needs than dogs, and homemade cat food can spell disaster if you don't know what you're doing.  On the other hand, it can make a world of difference to your cat's health - as well as your wallet - if you do it right.  So just do A LOT of research, and don't think you're going to find a recipe that you can feed to both species.

[P2C2E]

Today we picked up ingredients to make stillshimpy's Mulled Cider recipe and I'm super excited about it!

 

Also, backformore , I highly recommend an electric kettle. I have one and it's a lifesaver. 

[sunshinelover]

My latest kitchen disaster was an attempt to make overnight apple-cinnamon oatmeal in the crockpot.  You basically mix up your ingredients, dump it in and it's ready for breakfast.  So I did this right before bed and 8 hours later I woke up and my house smelled amazing!!  I was so excited to eat this...until I looked in my crockpot.  It had cooked too long and everything was mush.  Burnt at the edges mush.  Strange how it smelt so good for how burnt it was.  It took weeks of soaking my crockpot to get it all off.  It was terrible.  I think the oatmeal would be really good if cooked for less time, but now I'm scared to try again.

[harrie]

My sympathies, sunshinelover.  We do a lot of pot-soaking after various recipes at my house.  For what it's worth -- and it's probably irrelevant if your oatmeal was that burnt -- I hit the crockpot insert with spray fat before I dump in the oatmeal, and it's been working well, stickiness-wise.  Feel free to throw your crockpot straight at my head, but did you use steel cut oats?  Just wondering, and backing away slowly.

[PRgal]

A few years ago, I made spelt rolls for Thanksgiving that came out as hard as rocks.  It was the same recipe I used for soda bread a few weeks before, but for some reason, it didn't turn out.  Maybe it's because I put them in muffin cups instead of making an entire loaf.  Probably spent a little too long in the oven.

[stillshimpy]

Oh sunshinelover, I'm so sorry that happened!  You know overnight oats are often made in the fridge.  Just allowing the oats to soak that long in liquid does the same thing to them that cooking generally does.  Just in case you wanted to try overnight oats again. Then you can add the apple chunks either at night, or in the morning and warm them in the microwave :-)  Here's one recipe, in case you felt like trying that.  

[sunshinelover]

My sympathies, sunshinelover.  We do a lot of pot-soaking after various recipes at my house.  For what it's worth -- and it's probably irrelevant if your oatmeal was that burnt -- I hit the crockpot insert with spray fat before I dump in the oatmeal, and it's been working well, stickiness-wise.  Feel free to throw your crockpot straight at my head, but did you use steel cut oats?  Just wondering, and backing away slowly.

No I just used old-fashioned since that's what I had on hand.  And now that I look closer...they cook a lot faster!  Well now I know for next time at least :)

[GreekGeek]

Okay if I rat out a former college roommate? We were having a couple of guys over for dinner and studying, and she made a lemon icebox pie for dessert. Despite the fact that it was one of my favorite pies and I had been making it my whole life, she refused to let me help. She was a home ec major, her mom was a home ec teacher, so that made her an expert in the kitchen, right?

 

Guess again. She misread the recipe and used 3 Tbs of lemon juice instead of 3 tsp. When the pie didn't set up, she put it in the freezer. When it was time to serve the guys dessert, the pie still hadn't set up, so she spooned it into dessert glasses. Obviously, it was much too tart to eat. One of the guys, trying to be nice, said it tasted good, then added that he'd be tasting it all week.

 

She later made each of the guys a pie of their own, carefully reading the recipe of course.

Interesting! I googled a couple of lemon icebox pie recipes and they all call for much more than three teaspoons of lemon juice. How much sugar was in the pie? I can't imagine three tablespoons of lemon juice making the pie too tart unless there was almost no sugar.

[Sandman87]

I recall the time in 7th grade Home Economics class when we were teamed up to make bread. My partner needed glasses, and misread how much salt to use. We ended up with a loaf of stone. No kidding, we couldn't cut it with any knife available to us.

----

And then there was the time one of my housemates decided to make borscht. Turned out to be a literal kitchen disaster. I never got the story about how it happened, but somehow she ended up with a great big pot of boiling vinegar on the stove. Not vinegar and water, just vinegar. Boiling. Creating vinegar vapor. All of us, my five housemates and myself, had to flee the house because it turns out that breathing acid vapor is painful. Who knew? I ended up shutting off the power at the circuit-breaker box outside to turn off the stove. We opted for a nice safe pizza after that.

[Shannon L.]

Ok, here's what happened to me this weekend.  Maybe someone can figure out what I did wrong because I still can't figure it out. 

 

My daughter went on a baking binge this week.  Tons of sweet stuff came out of our kitchen all week long, including three loaves date nut bread.  We have never made this before, but it was my husband's favorite when he was a kid, so we found his grandmother's recipe and made some.  The ingredients are:  Dates, walnuts, boiling water, shortening, sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, baking soda and cream of tartar. 

 

My daughter made the first two by herself. The first one was perfect.  Golden crust, dense, but moist, pale color inside and delicious.  The next one she made seemed to fill up the pan more and it came perilously close to over flowing.  The little bit that came up onto the edge of the pan was burnt, but other than that it looked good.  However, we don't know about the taste or texture because we froze it for the following reason:

I baked the next one.  I followed the recipe and the only time I was unsure of anything was whether or not I'd lost count of the scoops of flour (I was worried that I went one scoop too many).  About the time it was almost done cooking, I started smelling something burning.  So, I opened the oven door and it had overflowed completely!  Dripped right onto the bottom of the stove.  That, plus the overflow parts on the pan, were burned and the rest of the crust was a little dark.  We decided to taste test it just in case.  The inside was this medium brownish color (like dead maple leaves--that orangey brown only a little bit darker).  The ends were more airy than dense, but toward the middle it got denser.  The taste is pretty good.  (So, because we cut into that one, we froze the other one. The first was long gone by then). Anyway, for the life of me, I can't figure out why it overflowed, why the color changed and why the texture was off at the ends.  I'm thinking if I did add too much flour, it would've come out really hard and inedible.  But, what could've gone wrong since we made the first one so well?

[EllieH]

Shannon L., did you mix up all 3 loaves at once, or one at a time?

[stillshimpy]

Jeez, for some reason I answered you on the wrong thread, Shannon:  Moved to the correct area: 

 

Shannon are you sure that the recipe is calling for baking powder + cream of tartar?   Because baking powder is essentially baking soda with cream of tartar and cornstarch added to it. 

 

So that's what I'm wondering, if it's actually calling for baking soda + cream of tartar?  It sounds like you may have too much of an acidic leavening action. 

Also, when are you adding the boiling water?   Any chance your daughter used baking soda in that first batch?

[Shannon L.]

EllieH, I mixed one at a time. 

 

Shannon are you sure that the recipe is calling for baking powder + cream of tartar?   Because baking powder is essentially baking soda with cream of tartar and cornstarch added to it.

I think you read my post wrong.  It did call for baking powder and I'm sure that's what we used.  The boiling water is supposed to go over the dates, then you're supposed to add the sugar and shortening.  After that, you wait for it to cool, then add everything else. 

 

It's a mystery, really.

[stillshimpy]

I think you read my post wrong.  It did call for baking powder and I'm sure that's what we used.

 

 

No, I  think I read the post right, Shannon, if it was calling for powder, although reading it now, it seems it does say soda?  Weird.  I apologize I could have sworn it said powder.   Did you use baking soda or baking powder?   it should have called for Baking Soda if you were adding  cream of tartar, because baking powder is comprised of baking soda, cream of tartar and some cornstarch.  You're sure you used baking powder?  Okay, that IS your problem then, but I have no idea why I read powder when the original post said soda.  I'd love to claim a Pinot moment or something, but I was and am sober as a judge for all of this.  

 

So by adding cream of tartar -- which is an acidic agent -- to baking powder, which would already have cream of tartar in it -- it would double the acid.  

 

So what I'm saying is "Huh, if you're adding cream of tartar to something in a cake recipe, that's usually a recipe that calls for baking soda, not baking powder"  

 

There should be too much acid in that recipe using baking powder and cream of tartar.  Hence the weird over-inflation of elements of it and also changing the acid balance within the cake too.    

 

As for why your daughter's turned out fine and yours didn't, I have no clue, unless her cream of tartar was out of date?  That's why I asked if it was a different batch, but even it if wasn't then that would also contain the answer, because with too much acid in the batter, the long it sat, the more it would...fizz, essentially.  Understand? 

 

I think the recipe should actually be calling for baking soda for those reasons.   As written it's calling for too much acid.  

 

You might want to try the recipe eliminating the cream of tartar would be the point.  Baking is basically just chemistry.  Your results indicate that you had an odd chemical reaction.  The reason you had that chemical reaction should be that should be double the amount of acid you would need. 

 

A lot of recipes call for both baking powder and baking soda, but a recipe calling for baking powder and then just adding cream of tartar may be (and given the results you are describing was) too much acid.  

 

As for the boiling water, I was trying to figure out if you'd added it to the baking powder plus cream of tartar .....which might be what needs to be done.  There are a lot of recipes that call for baking soda and vinegar (again chemical reaction stuff) and you add the vinegar to the soda and let it fizz itself primarily out (I am paring this explanation down) .  

 

So the way a recipe with baking powder and cream of tartar might work is if the heat was used to accelerate a chemical reaction before being put into the oven.....so that part's a complete mystery to me.

 

ETA:  Sorry, I had to type that with a lot of background stuff going on, for vegan baking (and I get that this isn't a vegan recipe, by the way, it's just a good source to look to for an explanation)  leavening agents and binding agents are handled differently.  I've never been very good at Vegan baking , but in reading your initial post, it sounded like one the leavening agents was off....because that's a result I've seen from a failed Vegan cupcake....crazy amounts of foaming ....and without going into the incredibly long (and I didn't let things curdle enough, pleasant eh?) explanation, the result you got is one that is sometime seen in Vegan baking.  

 

ETA 17 or so at this juncture:  If the recipe called for Baking Soda plus cream of tartar, and that's what you used, then it is something of a mystery.    If you used baking powder plus cream of tartar instead, then that would cause that freaky reaction.   

 

As for how I became convinced of that, I honestly don't know and am now just going to clutch my coffee cup for a while.  

Edited December 2, 2014 by stillshimpy

[Shannon L.]

 

I think you read my post wrong.  It did call for baking powder and I'm sure that's what we used.

 

No, I  think I read the post right, Shannon, if it was calling for powder, although reading it now, it seems it does say soda?

Argh!  I wrote my response wrong.  It was supposed to read "it did call for baking soda and I'm sure that's what we used".  Sorry to add to the confusion, especially since you were kind enough to write out all of that information!!  It was interesting, though--I'd always wondered what the difference was between powder and soda but never thought of it when sitting at a computer.  As for the rest, I guess it will have to remain a mystery.  A friend tasted it and wants to know if we'll bake him one, so we'll see if it happens again.

[stillshimpy]

The only thing I think could explain all of that was that I already knew that adding cream of tartar to baking powder would cause an acidic reaction, so that when I read your description, my mind kept subbing in what would cause that.  

 

Then I dragged the whole gang along on one of my patented "the train of my mind has derailed, come with me, it will be fun, or at the very least very confusing and if you're really lucky, I'll bring up an Emu or something completely absurd while trying to explain things!" 

 

Sadly, on both sides of my family I come from a line of teachers.    

 

You all just felt retroactively really sorry for all the students of my ancestors, didn't you?   

 

Well, that's understandable.  

 

Also.....Emu! 

[Sandman87]

Also.....Emu! 

There are a bunch of ranches in my area that raise emus as a meat source. If I ever find a store where I can buy emu meat I may have an entirely new disaster to report here.

[Mittengirl]

O.k., I have a kitchen disaster that does not involve cooking and barely involves food. It is, however, very appropriate for the upcoming holidays.

It was the mid 1970's, I was about 8 years old and it was Christmas Eve. I woke up in the wee hours of the morning to see what had gone on while I was asleep. Now, I was a non-believer by that age, so I wasn't look for Santa, just checking things out. I started a circuit through the house by going in the family room to check the stockings, moved on to the kitchen to get one of those plastic Little Hugs juice barrels (for those that don't remember them, they were plastic containers, slightly thinner than a milk carton, with a foil top) and then proceeded towards the living room to check out the tree. My mother had snuck up behind me and startled me just as I was leaving the kitchen. My hands jerked upwards and the juice container went flying. It hit either the floor or countertop and exploded. Juice covered everything - me, my mom, the dog, the cabinets, the fridge, the stove, the floors, the walls and the ceiling. 8 ounces never looked like so much fluid. After the dog and I took a shower and went to bed, my mom spent the rest of the early hours of Christmas morning cleaning the kitchen.

Moral of the story - before you startle someone, make sure they aren't carrying any liquids.