Have you ever wrecked dinner??

[Cookiebaker]

Gosh, I'm so annoyed tonight. For the second time since we were married, I made something truly inedible. :o:o:o Ugh what a disaster!! The part that annoys me is the time, and effort put into it, not to speak of time and food.

It was an "awesome" italian recipe, pasta with a tomato based sauce made from scratch. It called for a tablespoon of hot pepper flakes. WELL, it should have been barely a pinch. I'm not sure why, but the ENTIRE dish was sooooo hot you couldn't taste anything else. Ughghghghgh. I think I'll stick with Ragu next time....:p

[babolaypo65]

OOOH that's gotta be frustrating! I'm impressed it's only happened twice!

I can't really cook, so I'm always impressed with folks who can!

Drin lots of water!

[KYS]

I am also impressed it has only happened twice.
My downfall in the past has been over-cooking meat, poultry and fish. :rolleyes:

[CathyBogart]

I can cook dinner foods pretty well, though I overcook everything. My breakfast foods, however, are almost always totally inedible. I can ruin scrambled eggs.

[popcornbird]

I don't cook too much..........my mom usually makes the dinner. I cook once in a while though, and I *always* bake. Haven't had any disasters yet. So far so good. I know that when I have to start cooking on daily basis though........probably when I'm older and married, I'm certain I'll have disaster days too! I just haven't cooked enough to know yet! :p

[slick]

Back in 1977 just after I moved in with my first BF I decided to invite some friends over for dinner and decided to have a fondue (or "fundoo" as we used to call it). Someone told me that lobster meat was excellent to use for dipping so on my shopping trip I picked up some. Only problem was that I bought canned.....ever tried to get flaked lobster meat on a fondue fork??? And I had no other meat to offer them.....

Then later on in that same year I invited the same people over again, but this time for a roast beef dinner. I picked out the most beautiful looking roast in the store and made sure to put in the required amount of garlic cloves and marinated it overnight. The day of the dinner, I sweated over how long to cook it. I weighed and measured and decided that 2 hrs would be enough so that it would be rare and tender.

Well, while we and our company waited for dinner to cook, we kinda got into the stawberry margueritas and no one was feeling any pain :eek: When the "dinger" went off, I pulled the roast out of the oven and let it rest, then tried to cut it....and tried to cut it.....and tried to cut it......gave up.

Apparently, I bought a chuck roast.........

We howled with laughter and made another batch of drinks and feasted on potatoes, carrots and buns.

Needless to say......I never cooked for them again.

PS, I'm already giggling in anticipation of Richard's reply to this thread....:D :D

[K9karen]

ooo..Anna..I feel the pain! I can't eat anything hotsy-totsy...I like to taste and enjoy instead of sopping my tongue with tons of bread! At a Sweet 16" party (yes, youngsters we used to do that) I mistook hot pepper for oregano (ok it was dark in there) ..Needless to say....I also learned NEVER to ask the servers how hot something is (I ordered gumbo a few weeks ago) cause one person's hot is NOT anothers...There went my dinner... In New Orleans, 4 friends of mine entered a hot sauce contest! On the last taste, my one friend who LOVES hot stuff, very quietly said,,"oh, that's not."..*swallows* (no reaction) then SCREAMS *** HOT! She was tearing from pain and I was tearing from ROTFL! Oh. got carried away.. to answer your question.. in all modesty :o I love to cook and my boyfriend and family will luckily eat anything..I'm not "fancy" but I use a lot of condiments (no hot flakes :D ) and make up stuff. If and when I have time to bake, it's from scratch. Cooking and eating are at least 2 things I'm decent at...furgetabout other household duties ...

[K9karen]

Told ya.. I can't even remember to add, change my colors...:o :eek: :rolleyes:

[trayi52]

Hi,
Don't feel bad, I think we have all wrecked a few meals in our lifetime. If you cook, it is gonna happen! It is a miracle for me to get out of the kitchen without wrecking something.
I almost burned my kitchen down once, had blackened cabinets to prove it. Painted them, so now nobody notices. Thought you might like to read this. It came in one of my e-mails and I thought, wow this sounds like me.

Martha Will Not Be Joining Us This Year!

To my Thanksgiving Guests,
Martha Stewart will not be dining with us this Thanksgiving. I'm telling
you in advance, so don't act surprised.Since Ms. Stewart won't be
coming, I've made a few small changes:


Our sidewalk will not be lined with homemade, paper bag luminaries.
After a trial run, it was decided that no matter how cleverly done, rows
of flaming lunch sacks do not have the desired welcoming effect. The
dining table will not be covered with expensive linens, fancy china or
crystal goblets. If possible, we will use dishes that match and everyone
will get a fork. Since this IS Thanksgiving, we will refrain from using
the plastic Peter Rabbit plate and the Santa napkins from last
Christmas.

Our centerpiece will not be the tower of fresh fruit and flowers that I
promised. Instead we will be displaying a hedgehog-like decoration
hand-crafted from the finest construction paper. The artist assures me
it is a turkey.

We will be dining fashionably late. The children will entertain you
while you wait. I'm sure they will be happy to share every choice
comment I have made regarding Thanksgiving, pilgrims and the turkey
hotline. Please remember that most of these comments were made at 5:00
AM upon discovering that the turkey was still hard enough to cut
diamonds. As accompaniment to the children's recital, I will play a
recording of tribal drumming. If the children should mention that I
don't own a recording of tribal drumming, or that tribal drumming sounds
suspiciously like a frozen turkey in a clothes dryer, ignore them. They
are lying.


We toyed with the idea of ringing a dainty silver bell to announce the
start of our feast. In the end, we chose to keep our traditional method.
We've also decided against a formal seating arrangement. When the smoke
alarm sounds, please gather around the table and sit where you like. In
the spirit of harmony, we will ask the children to sit at a separate
table. In a separate room. Next door.

Now I know you have all seen pictures of one person carving a turkey in
front of a crowd of appreciative onlookers. This will not be happening
at our dinner. For safety reasons, the turkey will be carved in a
private ceremony. I stress "private" meaning: Do not, under any
circumstances, enter the kitchen to laugh at me. Do not send small,
unsuspecting children to check on my progress. I have an electric knife.
The turkey is unarmed. It stands to reason that I will eventually win.
When I do, we will eat.


Before I forget, there is one last change. Instead of offering a choice
between 12 different scrumptious desserts, we will be serving the
traditional pumpkin pie, garnished with whipped cream and small
fingerprints. You will still have a choice: take it or leave it.

Martha Stewart will not be dining with us this Year.

She probably won't come next year either.

I Am Thankful!!!

[Rio and Me]

I ca burn anything, if its said to be impossible to burn somthing i can burn it,lol
i can make a killer english brekkie though!!
Ky and Rio

[Edwina's Secretary]

According to my husband.....just about every Sunday! (Which is the only time I cook!)

[G.P.girl]

lol. i have a 50/50 record of messing up dinner

[Tonya]

It has happened to me countless times. Lol. Once, I made a meatloaf. I asked Mike how it was...he goes "Sweetie, lets not discuss the meatloaf." It was hard as a rock and weighed like 20 lbs. lmao.

[Randi]

Just after I met John (he was a photographer at the time) he had a job where a roast duck was involved. He had never had an assignment like that, so he asked for my help.

In the oven goes the duck and an hour later, I reckon it's brown enough to take out and put foil and flags on to photograph - but ... it was an old oven and had gone out. Well, we turned it on again, a bit higher, but an hour later, the same thing had happened. :mad:

Now, we didn't give up, but tried one more time, checking every now and again. A few hours later, it looked OK to photograph, and he did. Then back in with the duck, but we forgot about it, and realised, it had got a bit too much this time, the wings were nearly black, but luckily, there was enough meat to eat. :D

[trayi52]

Randi,
At least there was enough meat to eat!!:D :D

[RICHARD]

Originally posted by slick
.....ever tried to get flaked lobster meat on a fondue fork???

cellophane tape....

my lips are sealed....

[Kfamr]

the only time I can remember "wrecking" something while cooking was my first time making bacon. I wasn't sure when to take it out of the pan, so it got a little overly burnt.. but it still taste good!


I'd like to try some of the stuff you made though.... i looooooooooove hot hot spicy foods!:D

[K9karen]

yum. yum..well done crispy bacon! And Rio.. I love home made English brekkies!

[slick]

Originally posted by RICHARD
my lips are sealed....
Come on Richard, spill it. You know you waaaaaaaaannnnt to. :D :D

[anna_66]

I feel your pain Anna. I like the hot stuff while Mark does not, so I've completely ruined dinner for him (but hey, it tasted good to me:p ).

[catland]

I occasionally get the itch to try a new recipe, much to my husband's chargrin. It really bugs me when all the ingredients sound good separately, but taste like @#$#@$ when put all together.

One thing I've learned, especially with sauces is to taste as you go. I recently saved a barbeque pork recipe when I tasted it and it was awful. I wanted it to have more of a bbq flavor so I looked at the ingredients on the back of a bbq sauce bottle and got creative. I actually salvaged this meal.:)

[Cataholic]

Only twice? You are ahead of the game, IMO. I once made pancakes that looked EXACTLY like chicken breasts....no one would touch them. I threw them out, they BOUNCED off the trash can.

I think a 'secret' to cooking is knowing how to salvage meals. For instance, CB, you coulda added half a jar of store bought to lower the temp....or, a whole jar, and froze the other half for another meal...

I love to cook, and love to experiment. It is such an expression of love/caring...so, like any other time, sometimes, we just miss the mark.

For those afraid to cook....develop 4-5 dishes that you just can't mess up....and leave it at that, or improvise on those....the more you experiment (and bomb) the better you become. AND, if your guest won't eat it? Have the local carryout on speed dial.

[Rio and Me]

K9karen, with all everything!! ummmm i could do with one now ummmm

mine consist of fried eggs, crispy bacon, saugages (?sp), baked beans, fried tomatos, garlic mussrooms (?sp), homemade potato rosti's (?sp), bread, fried onions and a nice ice cold larger to wash it down with!!!
very fattening but very tasty, what i cant eat Rio has then we walk it off on the moors!!
perfect for cold mornings!
Ky and rio