Be afraid! I teach my offspring to cook, beginning with playdough!

most embarrassing moments—culinary edition

By Kitty Sanders, Guest Contributor

And I thought I was bad in the kitchen!

Ah . . . the kitchen. The heart, the hearth, the holiest of Holies in the human habitat. The place where the heart of the family creates nutritious and aesthetically pleasing meals to nurture her children. The workshop for instructing offspring on how to do everything from the same to budgeting to history homework. The haven from the world where intimate conversations about romance and plans and hopes and dreams are discussed with love and understanding. The stress-free zone in which . . . all of this rarely happens and more often than not, there is fussing, clawing, demanding, whining and the creation of, and I use the term loosely, food that may, if I'm lucky, sustain life.

I have always fancied myself a bit of a renegade in the kitchen. Why not add a little cayenne to the fudge sauce? Kill two endorphins with one recipe, so to speak. 
When we get together as a family or with friends, my children LOVE to pull out the kitchen failure card to show everyone. In their defense, it's not as if I haven't given them a lot of good material over the years.
 
Below, 'sample' some of my more glorious disasters:

1. They always seem to start with their favorite, the Cream of Wheat milkshakes. I wanted to give them a warm, healthy breakfast on the go. So I cooked up a mess of the hearty cereal and poured it into a mug, added milk and flavorings, such as vanilla, chocolate, root beer, lemon and peppermint. YUM!, said none of them ever as they gagged it down, heaving for dramatic effect. 
2. Then there was the fish. I love fish. This particular failure was sole, which I wanted to nutrition up with some veggies, so I baked it with spinach, tomatoes, and onions. The acidity of the tomatoes did nothing to brighten the fish, the spinach just laid there limp and whimpering, and the onions overpowered the whole dish. What a disaster. 
3. I love baked New York style cheesecake and bake it only on special occasions because of the expense, both monetarily and calorie-wise. One time, we had the missionaries from church over, so I decided to whip one up. My cheesecakes stand on their own and need no extra toppings, she bragged. After dinner, I pulled out this gorgeous masterpiece and sliced it generously, serving our guests first and then my children. The poor missionaries asked meekly if there was topping for it and I beamed proudly, "no, certainly not." They politely ate it, bringing up more than a few times how they were watching their caloric intake and couldn't really finish the servings I gave them. Then one of the kids chimed in, "what's wrong with this?" I finally took a bite and realized the problem. I had forgotten one little ingredient—sugar! It was bitter, heavy and otherwise unpalatable.  I apologized profusely and then ran and retrieved some homemade strawberry preserves from the fridge and dolloped heaping spoonfuls onto my mistake. It went down a little easier, but what a shameful waste of cream cheese and eggs.
4. Then, another favorite, is my one and only grilling experience. I don't grill. My then husband grilled. He was the grill master. I was the fetcher, the condiment-or, and the side-dish-er. Wanting to impress him that I could, in fact, do this simple little chore, I went out and lit up the gas grill before he got home from work. I got some nice cuts of meat ready and slapped them on and just as I did so, I felt drops of rain falling. I looked up to an ostentatiously stormy sky and then it went black. I clumsily wheeled the grill, now covered in dinner, up the back steps and into the kitchen. There is a reason they are outdoor grills. Outdoor gas grills. Outdoor gas grills that emit smoke into the sky where it dissipates and doesn't bother anyone.  When you bring an outdoor gas grill into the house, the smoke has nowhere to dissipate except the smoke alarms, where it seems to all gravitate toward, hoping to reunite with other noxious fumes for a grand choking party. It was nice to know we had neighbors who cared. A lot of them. In my yard. Sympathetically patting my head like I was 5 and then smirking at one another at my lack of horse sense.
5. Another time, I put on 3 dozen eggs to boil and decorate for Easter. Then I went for a ride. Yep, completely forgot those stupid eggs. Water boiled out. Eggs black and broken. Pot thrown out. Stupidity and carelessness acknowledged. Enough said.
6. One time, however, my disaster turned into a blue ribbon. I was making a big pot of chili for a Cub Scout cook-off and it was a very busy day. I gathered the ingredients, got it simmering, and hung laundry out to dry. Then did some vacuuming. Then did a few more chores. Then smelled something smoky. Yes, darlings, it was the chili and yes, it was scorched into a thick, black, crusty layer on the bottom. But the top 9/10 was just fine. I gently transferred it into another pot, careful not to scrape, and got it ready to go without tasting. When I won the blue ribbon, they asked how I got that wonderful smoky flavor into it. My secret!

Cooking is an adventure, like anything else. Have some fun, take some chances, and you never know how things may turn out. Life should be delicious, even with mistakes.

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