Cooking Mishaps

Yesterday I was peeling potatoes and my finger got in the way and I sliced a good chunk of my finger off. So I thought it might be fun to hear what sort of kitchen disasters, big or small, you have had. Please share

News for Blibble -

Thats NOT what they mean when they say "finger food".

While I was in college, I worked in a sandwich store. One of my duties was to slice the sandwich meats and then clean the slicing machine afterwards. At least once a week I'd cut myself on the stupid thing, which was bad enough, but then afterwards, when making sandwiches (which included oil and vinegar) the pain of that stuff going into the cut was awful.

After I was done complaining about a particularly bad cut, the assistant manager (a young guy who wasn't particularly bright, but was as funny as hell) took it upon himself to show me the correct way to use the slicer. As he was slicing one of the cheeses he announced, "Hey look at me, I'm cutting the cheese" and to add to the joke he tried to force himself to fart. He ended up shitting in his pants. (The name of the store was "Submarine Village"; thereafter he was known as the Village Idiot).

I can't list anything in particular. Every time I cook it's a mishap.

There's too many burns from the oven and slits on the finger too count.

Hope your finger's okay blibble. I was expecting a mishap such as burning a steak or something.

When my younger boy was in fourth grade, he was opening a microwaveable can of pasta. As he was opening the tab and pulled back the top, he sliced a couple of his fingers and needed eight stitches.

His finger was bandaged and he wasn't allowed to play sports for ten games. His team had a playoff game on the ninth day, so we let him play a little early.

While dribbling the ball, he noticed his bandage, which had been covering his fingers, had fallen off. He continued to dribbleas he was searching the floor for it. He finally found it, kept his dribble going and scooped it up. It was only then that he decided to pass to put the bandage on.

My mishaps are mostly burns from the oven when I'm broiling.

Hey! You stole my line.

I tried making a birthday cake for my wife when we were dating.


She threw it at me.


The whole cake.

I have burned myself more times than I care to imagine. I now try to remember to wear oven mitts when possible.

I do remember cutting myself pretty badly one night, but it was after dinner (and several bottles of wine) when I was washing the dishes. I was sort of drunk, so I hardly noticed that I had taken a chunk off my knuckle.

As for cooking mishaps, I was trying out a new dessert recipe and the recipe said to melt butter and then roll the dough balls in the melted butter and then sugar and cinnamon. Well, I completely misunderstood and ADDED the melted butter to the sugar and cinnamon. I ended up with a sopping, sticky mess.

I periodically set off the smoke alarm in my kitchen. Any self-respecting Indian dish should make a lot of smoke and bring tears to the eyes and fill the entire home with aroma from the spices Kitchens in US are designed for very mild cooking Usually I don't have any mishaps with the food itself. I am an extremely reluctant cook, but whenever I do cook something special, it turns out really well.

When I first got married I was burning my hand or fingers a couple times a week.

And then the Colonel bought you a frying pan, right?

Can somebody tell me why I find this hilarious?

Wasn't funny at the time. First time on my own just learning how to cook. We went trough alot of mac and cheese.

Hey, when I was younger I used to burn my hand lotsa times!

Oh...you meant cooking...

Never mind.

Signor V.

Nothing major on my end other than completely wasting money on good food i ruined... I keep a fire extinguisher on hand, never had to use it, I guess the biggest mishap was trying to make paella once and just wound up eating the seafood and throwing out most of the rice... emeril often says "the best part about cooking, is that you still get to eat even if you made a mistake"... true, how good it tastes is another issue... but nothing worse than paying top dollar for a piece of seafood or steak and then just destroying it because you didnt take the time/thought/planning to do it right... entering november this reminds me why i never cooked a turkey, one of these days maybe, but till now, going over friends or relatives has worked just fine and just as well as roitesserie turkey from the supermarket... LOL

So YOU are my downstairs neighbor??!!

I didn't know I was triggering off smoke alarms all the way till NJ. It is serious indeed then

My wife makes turkey in the crock pot.

It is so tender and juicy I can't eat a turkey from the oven anymore!

Care to share her recipe LN. I might try it this Thanksgiving.

Well she gets a turkey small enough to fit in a big crockpot, has me cut off the ribs, puts some water in there, salt, pepper, and maybe a few other spices. Cook on low for 8-12 hours or so.

I think that's it.

Does she stuff the turkey before she puts it in the crockpot?

Anyone ever try deep frying a turkey?

I've seen big deep fryers on sale at WalMart (made especially for turkeys) and have always wondered what it tasted like (deep-fried).

SC, I never have, but one of Mr. Babe's coworkers tried it last year. It takes forever, and your wings and drumsticks burn, because you have to cook it so long. Plus, you have to do it in your garage, because you can't have the thing in the house - I think it's a fire hazard. Plus, you use a gazillion gallons of oil.

I'll be making my nice sausage stuffing and putting my turkey in the oven.

We did that a couple years ago at a big family dinner. Everybody enjoyed it. Tasted great.

I tasted it once and it was outstanding. It's been a very popular way to make a turkey.

It is a fire hazrd, and I wouldn't even cook it in a garage. In fact, I wouldn't use the fryer anywhere near a house as those things have been known to result in fast spreading grease fires. There have been thousands of fire, mostly, I believe, from the heated oil overflowing when the turkey is lowered.

I have to tell you, I love just about anything deep-fried, but I can't imagine lowering a 25 lb. turkey into a big vat of boiling oil.

Delish.

Hello this is Mrs. Longneck I don't stuff it because there is evidence that the stuffing then contains more bacteria from the Turkey so I cook mine separate. I do use the juices thought to make it instead of water so that you get that turkey flavor but its safer. I don't know how you could stuff it and put it in the crock pot because theres nothing to stuff after cutting the ribs off you have to do this so that the Turkey breast will fit. Its just the Turkey breast because Casey does not like the dark meat and neither do I.

Then I put some water in it or the bottom dries out eventually the Turkey will release enough juice that you may need to remove some of the juice before its actually done. I also put salt, pepper (fresh ground), and also some herbs or Italian seasoning that way it looks nice too. When you go to remove it from the pot it will fall apart into peices its sooooo tender and juicy.

I put it on low the night before like at 10 or 11 and then its ready the next day at 11 or 12 then I turn to warm just so it stays warm until I get the sides ready.

My brother-in-law cooks his turkey this way every year, and it does come out perfect. As others have mentioned though, it can be very dangerous, and I don't recommend anyone trying it without knowing what they're doing.

Many years ago, for a Christmas dinner, we decided to make an old-fashioned mince pie the traditional way.

I started weeks in advance, preparing the mincemeat. This mostly consisted of periodically replenishing the alcohol content as everything was absorbed.

Well, when it came time to eat the baked mince pie, it was inedible to almost everyone. It tasted like pure turpentine. Our modern American taste buds were just not used to the real, traditional, homemade mince pies the way they were made back in the time of Charles Dickens. One woman did say that she would like to bring any and all leftovers to her elderly father. He was Irish, and hadn't had something like this in many years; this would absolutely remind him of what he grew up enjoying. So, she took pretty much the entire pie home with her, with our blessing. Her dad loved it.

Signor V.

Thank you, Mrs. Longneck. I'm going to keep your recipe and try it out sometime.

I don't think it matters what the topic is in the food and drink section. The conversation always ends up with sharing recipes.

I love deep fried turkey, I've had it down south and it's delicious, but talk about a potential kitchen disaster?

Here's a link: Deep Fried Turkey Disaster

I'v only recently heard many say that deep fried turkey is really good. I'd try it, but damn, after seeing that video, it'd be just my luck I'd not just burn my house down but probably wipe out my entire family. That's really scary.
Surely there's gotta be an easier way to deep fry a turkey?????


TIS

That video was funny. Haha amateurs

A basic deep frying rule: Never let the oil get very hot.

Whatever it is, keep the heat to the minimum. It takes forever to start getting hot, but once it gets hot, it hardly needs much additional heat to maintain the temperature. You can also avoid food turning into charcoal

Well they did say the turkey was only partially thawed and that's why the huge fireball. All I can say to whomever might try it..follow directions very carefully.

I have had my share of cooking mishaps, and was trying to think of a really different one, but I guess I've had the normal mishaps like burning the roast or undercooking the turkey; one time as a newlywed, we had another couple over for dinner. I had just learned how to make spaghetti sauce. The only problem was I only made enough sauce for two people but cooked enough noodles for four. Needless to say, the pasta was pretty darn dry. Don't know what I was thinking. I must say though, that particular blunder never happened again.

My family in Michigan and my aunt's family still tease me about my famous "lopsided" cake. Don't even ask. I don't know what/how I did it but it was an oblong cake that more or less looked like a hill.

TIS

As much as I love biscuits and gravy, I can't make biscuits to save my life. They come out like paper weights. So I buy

Mig,

I can't make pie crust!! I tried for years and finally gave up. It seems like I'd always have to end up patching it together. I'll buy the frozen crust, it's easier.

I feel I'm better (and more confident) at cooking meals as opposed to desserts. Maybe cause I don't usually care too much for the desserts, I don't know. Yet, I can make chocolate cookies from scratch and those aren't bad.

TIS

TIS,

I'm like you. I'm better at making the meals than making desserts. I don't do the pie crusts either. I buy the frozen ones to. Maybe one of these days I'll try to make one.

Years ago, one of my cousins had company over and bought a couple of those forzen pies. They were very popular in the 70's (I think they still make them). They were chocolate, lemon or banana cream. You simple take them out of the freezer and after a half hour or so serve it, no baking. Anyone she put them in the oven. Talk about liquid pie.

TIS

Frozen pie crusts are disgusting

We nearly always used packaged biscuits and pie crusts. After a continuous series of disasters with the crusts, we gave up and looked around for a good commercial brand. I really think that's the key - experimentation because there is so much to choose from out there.

One pseudo-mishap comes to mind, but it has nothing to do with baking:

Around 15 years ago, I gave my late father and The Bee-yotch (his wife) our recipe for pasta with tuna and olive sauce (I posted it in another thread in this forum). I mailed them the full instructions, and waited to hear how everything turned out.

After a couple of weeks, I still hadn't heard anything, so I called him and asked him what they thought of the tuna sauce recipe. He said it was terrible. I was shocked, to say the least. I asked him if they had followed my directions exactly, and he said they had. Then I asked him if there were problems with the spaghetti. "Spaghetti?" he replied. "Yeah," I said, "What happened with the spaghetti?" There was a silence on the other end of the phone, then he sheepishly confessed that they hadn't made any! He had forgotten all about that part. I gently reminded him that it was a sauce, meant to be served over pasta, and that they should try it once more, but the proper way. But, stubborn person that he was, he wouldn't do it.

After that, I gave up. I don't believe I ever sent him another recipe.

Signor V.

SV,

You're right on the variety of frozen crusts these days. They have some supposedly "easy to roll" dough I have yet to try.

Talking about biscuits, etc, true story from just a couple hours ago. I went to the grocery store with my daughter (the one with 3 kids). She's loading up the cart and gets some frozen mini pancakes. She makes a comment about how she's not making the "homemade" kind......"I said you mean like Aunt Jemima where you just add water?" She said "yes". I cracked up and said, "that's not homemade. Homemade is buying the proper flour and making literally from scratch. We both got a good laugh.

TIS

Megan makes homemade pie crusts from scratch. I don't really like sweets or pies that much but her Peach pie (fresh peaches) was....I don't know what to call it, awesome and wonderful don't do it justice...

I started using the Pillsbury Pie Crust and Pepperidge Farm Pastry Sheets rather than go through the agony of making my own. The pie crust can be bought where you pick up the biscuits. It's so much easier, and they are very tasty.

Me too, Babe, pride be damned!

I do the same thing with pizza dough. There are several local pizzerias that are happy to sell me the dough, one or two at a time. This way, it never goes into the plastic bags, like say--Addeo's, in the supermarkets.

Always fresh.

Pride be damned is right! The pie crusts are very good, and I use the Pepperidge Farm Pastry Sheets for my favorite, no-brainer - Brie en croute (think I spelled that right), although that did lead to a cooking mishap once. I forgot to "vent" the brie after I took it out of the oven. When my guests sliced into it, they brie poured out all over the place, just like lava.

I don't think it takes very long to make a pie crust from scratch, maybe Megan just makes it look easy.

I've never heard of the Brie stuff you're talking about, SB.

It's really good, LN. You wrap a round brie in a pastry sheet, matching all the ends. Then you put it in the oven, end side down, until the pastry browns. When you take it out of the oven, put a vertical slice in the top to allow it to vent. Do this about 20 minutes or so before you serve it so that you avoid the "brie lava" that I experienced. It's a very simple thing to serve your guests and it's more impressive than plain cheese and crackers.

Cooking mishap - I wanted a two egg omelette today. I got everything ready (scrambling the eggs, lightly oiled the pan, etc.) and poured the eggs into the pan after a few minutes.... it wasn't cooking.

I could feel the heat and couldn't understand "why" it wasn't cooking.

Then it hit me.... I turned on the wrong burner on the stove.

What is Brie en croute?

See my post above SC's. It's all explained there.

I was cleaning the stove top yesterday and needed to rest my free hand on something, so I reached to touch the oven, forgetting my daughter was cooking brownies. OUCH!

Sounds like something I would do. Have you ever put a pan of biscuits in the oven and forget to turn it on?

I did that with dinner a couple weeks ago. I mashed potatoes, steamed the veggies and waited for the meat to get done. I turned the timer on, but didnt' bother turning the oven on.

If I had the money and didn't want to weigh 220 pounds I'd just eat out every night.

There was one very serious cooking mishap that happened when I was a little over two years old. In fact, it is possibly my earliest memory.

We lived in a small house in the suburbs, and it happened one afternoon when my father was at work.

I was with my mother, and we were both in the kitchen. She was making preparations for dinner, and was preheating the oven. After several minutes, she checked the oven and noticed that it was not lit. So, she opened the oven door to relight it. I was standing quite near her. She didn't realize that the gas had built up within the oven, and as she bent over and struck the match all the gas ignited with what I can only describe as a noise like a huge explosion. A literal wall of flame shot out of the oven over my mother and me. The fireball was huge, but it only lasted around a second or two - we were burned, but not set on fire. I ran screaming out of the house through the kitchen's side door absolutely convinced my mother had been killed. Nobody could possibly live through that, I thought. Neighbors found me still screaming in the backyard, holding my hands to my face to try and stop the pain from the burns.

Amazingly enough, the burns were actually minor, and we were both okay in a few days. But, at the time, to a two-year-old, it seemed like the end of the world.

Signor V.

Wow...they had electricity back then?

That's a scary story, Signor V. Your mother must have been worried. What kind of burns did you both have?

Those brief fireballs are something else. On a much smaller scale, I was once cooking on a grill at a picnic/fundraiser, and lifted the top of the grill, and saw nothing but a sudden, brief wall of flame all around. I didn't feel a thing, other than a rush of surprise, but seconds afterward someone asked me, "Where did your eyebrows go?"

Sr. Vitelli's story reminds me of a similar one of my own. My ex and I bought a house in 1980. One of its main selling points to us was its modern, well equipped kitchen. It had a six burner stove with two ovens and we were anxious to try it. The day we moved in I went to light the oven, holding a match to the oven's pilot light, but it didn't light. I tried the other oven. Same result. I couldn't figure it out until ALL OF A SUDDEN the oven went on.... we'd never had a self-igniting oven before.

It was a gas stove - still the best way to cook as far as I'm concerned.



The burns were first-degree and our hair and eyebrows were a bit singed. My mother also sprained her wrist because she fell over when the flames flashed. She got the worst of it - she was kneeling down right in front of the open oven door while I was standing a couple of feet to her right, watching her.

My father came home as fast as he could and we both saw the doctor that day. I remember we were given some sort of salve for the burns, and my mother's wrist was bandaged. She was told to rest in bed for a few days, which she did.

All in all, probably the scariest moment of my young life.

Signor V.

This isn't a cooking mishap, but it's along the same line of discussion with exploding fire and gas...

I used to work for a hotel as a bellman/valet and every room had a gas fireplace that burned real wood. People often times couldn't figure out how to light the fireplace so they would call for help.

I learned early on that when the guest says "Oh, I turned the gas off" they probably turned it all the way up.

I went to light the fireplace for them and like SV said, it was like a wall of flame shot towards me. Fortunately my eyebrows were in tact, but the hair on my hands and about half way up my arms were completely gone! It all happened so fast and really didn't hurt, but it was amazing how fast the hair disappeared!

Not to depart from the topic, but it is amzing how quickly hair burns.

When I was in college, I remember being in a bar one night with friends and while one of my buddies with a full, thick head of hair was talking to a girl, another friend lit his hair on fire. It went up in flames so fast that we snuffed it out. The girl screamed, but the guy whose head was ablaze was wondering why we were smacking him in the head. Most of his hair was gone.

do they grow back again after getting burnt?

Yes. His did, but we put the fire out before it really reached the scalp.

I believe with severe burning, there can be permanent damage to the skin and roots that sometimes prevents hair from regrowing.

Some "friend"!

Signor V.

The good news is that the friend, who lit the guy's hair on fire, was bald within 5 years. Karma's a bitch.

I must've missed this thread the first time around...lots of interesting stories!

It's nice to read here and know that I'm not alone in cooking troubles. haha

Several years ago, I tried making an Italian Cream Cake, something my mom makes often and well. It's three layers, and my screw-up was that I somehow forgot about the icing and put two layers together with nothing in between. We were able to get the top layer off okay to add the icing, luckily. My fear was that the layer would just crumble apart when we tried moving it.

And I get really mad at myself anytime I burn cookies, so much that I think I've become paranoid, and now my mom claims I try to take them out too soon. I like to notice people's various cookie preferences. My brother likes chewy soft cookies, what seems not fully cooked. My grandpa actually likes burnt cookies, so he's the savior when I burn any, because I know he'll eat them.

I had a cooking mishap, I ate a 2 inch think Delmonico too fast

Hmmm, I guess the Thread killer strikes again

Cooking mishaps?

I turn on the oven.

It's downhill from there.

I find myself cooking according to my moods. Sometimes I'll be all anxious to try a recipe and will cook for hours if necessary. Other days, not so much.

More of a brewing mshap than a cooking mishap.

When I got my first espresso maker about 20 years ago (my how time flies), we had a coule over for dinner and I was going to show off my espreso making skills (of course this was going to be the second time I made espresso.

Anyway, as you know some of the older machines (and curent ones) have a metal filter with minute holes in which the pressure forces the water through the filter. For mine you had to slide the filter up and "screw" it on.

So I load er up and the pressure is building and then boom! it explodes! Evidently I did not have it on tight enough and the pressure forced it open.

Coffee and ground were everywhere and I swear 20 years later I am still removing grounds from my ears. I fortunately was about 10 feet away or I woud have been nailed and prbably hurt. It blew a hole in the wall and we also had one of those "popcorn" type ceilings -- try cleaning coffee and grounds fro one of those babies.

After the explosion and realization that no one was injured all we could do was laugh and then.... go down the stret to the coffee house for some espresso.

I love bacon but bacon hates me. My girlfriend can stand there and cook bacon the whole time with no problem. As soon as I walk up and stand there for a second the bacon pops and shoots hot grease on me. I've been hit by popping bacon so many times I really think I'm cursed when it comes to frying it. I've even been hit in the eye by it.

Maybe that's not a mishap, but it's definitely a painful ongoing battle for me.

Blib, microwave your bacon. Three minutes for two rashers. Presto.

I'm not sure I want to know what a "rasher" is.

Microwaving your bacon doesn't give the crispiness that frying or grilling does, and it'll shrink it considerably. But it's quicker, easier, and doesn't alter the taste.

That actually sounds good. I'm not a big fan of crispy bacon. I'll try microwaving it.

A bacon tray will come in handy; also known, I believe, as a defrosting tray (I re-name things according to my own purpose ):

^ The fat drains into the grooves. Cover it with a microwaveable bowl.

You could always try pre-cooked bacon. Boar's Head brand makes a surprisingly good one. You simply pan fry it for a few seconds to warm it up.

sounds good

off topic buuuuuuut

I just got a set of Knives an some whisks... so I may have some cooking mishaps in the near future

Cooking Mishaps? None, whatsoever.

Now, cooking preparation mishaps....in a matter of 2 days I managed to slice my thumb open (Perpendicular to the nail), took a few weeks to heal and then next I cut myself about an inch across right below my thumb on my palm. The cool part about it was that I hit the vain and the knife stayed in and actually blew the vain out, it causes another small hole next to the cut where the blood forced out (I have no idea how this happened). My girlfriend doesn't let me play with knives anymore now

It doesn't top DMC's grizzly misadventures with knives but a few months ago I was innocently making a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli or spaghetti & meatballs or whatever and cut my left thumb pretty badly trying to open the can. There was a profuse amount of blood everywhere and the gash took quite a while to heal. Needless to say I now employ greater caution while opening cans of Chef Boyardee and other canned foods.

The exact thing happened to my son 3 1/2 years ago.And it was Chef Boyardee ravioli with the pop top for the microwave. My daughter told me that he was bleeding and he was fine until I took his hand, squeezed it and the blood squirted up. He got a few stitches, and couldn't play basketball for ten days.

He actually played after 7 days because his team was in the playoffs. During the game, while dribbling the ball, the thick bandage came off. Realizing it came off, he started looking all over for it...while dribbling the ball the whole time. He finally found it, scoooped it up and only then did he pass the ball so he could put it back on.

The doctor in the ER said that it was surprising the number of people who slice themselves opening those cans.

There are two types of openers that I know of. The ones with a circular blade that make an incision on the tin are the dangerous ones. The ones which cleanly remove the top without making any cut are fantastic. I am using one such can opener for more than a year and it is one of the most satisfactory tools to use

The one my son used was a pop top with a tab that you pop, like a can of soda, and then peel back.

I use a can opener that cuts through the top, and then you twist the knob and it cuts around. How do you open the can without making any cuts?

Yeah, I got cut on the same one. With a can of pop or beer though, the tab doesn't flip up with the same force and at the same angle as the Chef Boy can and that's why you really can't cut cut yourself while opening a cold one. The old Chef Boy cans didn't have the dangerous pop tops so they could be opened pretty easily with a decent can opener but the new ones all have the pop tops. Just a case of a company not being able to leave well enough alone.

Even in mine, you need to twist the knob and it "cuts" around. But the cut is not the same as in regular opener.The teeth of the cutter are very fine (it is not that circular sharp disc). It removes it from the periphery of the top lid and you cannot even see the cut. My cutter is from "good cook" which you can get in walmart. It is impossible to get cuts from the partially opened tin with this opener.

Good one:


The dangerous/bloody version:

I just poke a fountain pen in the lid, and suck the contents out.

Thanks, svsg.

That's considered fine dining in England.