Biggest mistake/disappointment

[JDP]

I know we have all had that great idea that didn't pan out the way we thought. Mine was last summer. I was trying out my new vertical smoker with a side firebox. I had pork butts and baby back ribs. The meats were rubbed and stood for 24 hours. I was out at 6 am stoking the fire box ready to go filled with excitement. My hickory chips were well soaked the coals were glowing. Life was good. I put the meats in the the chamber, the chips on the coals and watched as I waited fod the temp to hit 250 degrees. I waited and waited. Started up more coals and put them in. Opened both vents to full but could only get to 225 degrees. Well I kept spraying the meats down and pulled the ribs 4 hours later leaving the butts to keep cooking. I wrapped the ribs in tin foil after giving them their final spray of apple cider. That night I reheated them in the oven on low heat. Brimming with pride I served them to my family. I took a bite to find an almost jerky like texture, dry and tough. My wife told me that they weren't that bad but I was pissed. All that time and effort down the drain. Come to find out that those little thermometers they sell you along with the grill are not completely accurate. I purchsed a digital themometer and found out it was 125 degrees off. I now cook with 2 digitals, one for the box temp and one for the meat.

Any other disasters out there?

JDP

 

[Nicholas Mosher]

My endless attempts at roasting a whole chicken to perfection. I feel like a mouse running in an exercise wheel to nowhere. Thank god I don't track the time I have expended pursuing this endeavor...

Some day I'll probably figure it out and have a heart-attack, keeling over into my oven...

 

[Caine]

My second marriage.

 

[JDP]

My second marriage.

Now that's funny. Although my original intent was a cooking not life experience.

JDP

 

[angelbear9114]

I make these lovely cookies called Chocolate Crinkles...Well one day DH suggested that marshmellows would be lovely in the cookies. Well the next time I baked I added the marshmellows to the recipe and well the pans needed a lot more than elbow grease to get the gooey mess off of the bottoms (more like a sand blaster). But with a few tweaks the recipe would probably make some really good gooey brownies.

 

[YT2095]

"I purchsed a digital themometer and found out it was 125 degrees off"

dude, that`s several orders of Magnitude off!
I hardly think you can Blame yourself for the way it turned out

 

[goboenomo]

Trying to make cookies with the one egg I had left in my fridge, instead of 2, or maybe 3....
Half the cookies fell apart being taken off the baking sheet.

 

[Loprraine]

Baking a whole salt crusted fish and not being able to get the salt off. Pass the water, please.

 

[YT2095]

Being in a hurry whilst cooking/serving up and Totaly forgot to close the freezer door, it stayed open all night and the lot was ruined.
I wasn`t on a lot of money back then either, we got used to baked beans on toast pretty quick though

 

[JDP]

Baking a whole salt crusted fish and not being able to get the salt off. Pass the water, please.

I did a similar thing but I put a few slices into the skin. What was I thinking? One bite and it was like Medusa's gaze had hit you and you turned into a salt statue. We could have put it outside and used it for a deer lick. I believe you know what that is Loprraine as you too enjoy the taste of wild game.

At least I think it was Madusa from some Greek Mythology movie I saw.

JDP

 

[Katie H]

Buck and I have always enjoyed cooking and especially like to cook together. Back in the olden days - dating days, that is - we would occasionally find ourselves with a weekend alone together. We were both single parents.

At any rate, we came across a chicken recipe that sounded oh so yummy and decided to prepare it on a rare "alone" weekend. The recipe was quite involved and included a number of unusual and expensive ingredients. Since we were going to make only enough to serve two, we bit the bullet and purchased all the ingredients.

We brought everything to my apartment and proceeded to chop, saute, deglaze, roast, you name it. It took hours to prepare and we had a wonderful time working together. Plus, the kitchen smelled heavenly and we were eager to try this sure to be awesome dish.

To make the meal extra special, we used all the best china and glassware and set the table like the finest restaurant, complete with candles and a bottle of good wine.

Moment of truth. Oh, pew! Yuck! Awful. Chucked the whole thing in the dumper along with the recipe and ordered delivery pizza. More than 30 years later we still laugh about "Chocolate Chicken."

The pizza was delicious, though. I think it had more to do with the candlelight and the company than the pizza.

 

[VeraBlue]

I believe the formula was 10 pounds of 10X to 3 pounds of butter....something like that for a buttercream icing I was making. I had just been hired to work in a professional kitchen and one of the first assignments was to make buttercream icing. I had put all the butter into a free standing mixer big enough for pygmies to bathe in.... and whipped them till they were double in volume and fluffy like clouds. The mixer attachment, by the way was a big as my torso. There was about 15 pounds of butter in the mixer, already. I proceeded to dump bag after bag of 10X into the mixing bowl.

Then I turned it on.

After the sugar cloud settled, and the big black man next to me stopped looking like Burl Ives....it dawned on me that I should have added the sugar one bag at a time.

That was 14 years ago. I suspect they are still wondering how all that sugar got onto the ceiling.

 

[Galleywench]

Well when I was a teenager my boyfriend and his friend wanted me too cook up some steak (Porterhouse) and they added can you make a pepper steak? I looked in the only cook book and it said add about 1/8" to 1/4" of pepper and broil. Well I did just that and I had almost no cooking experience at that time it never came into my mind that Cayenne pepper is not the same thing as black pepper!!!!!! WOW was that a HOT steak !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OOps

 

[Loprraine]

Wow. I had forgotten about the salt licks we put in the fields for the cows. Thanks for a great reminder. but, the dinner was ruined. I think I made some shrimp and a cheese plate .

 

[JDP]

Wow. I had forgotten about the salt licks we put in the fields for the cows. Thanks for a great reminder. but, the dinner was ruined. I think I made some shrimp and a cheese plate .

Mine too but like the Pheonix I rose from the ashes ( or actually the salt mines) and have made a salt crusted snapper that was actually edible.

JDP

 

[goboenomo]

Just today at work I was making quesadillas and I had an order for one without tomato. I made it, and was half way done cooking it when I realized, crap! I put tomatoes on it! So I moved that one to the corner of the flattop where it was much cooler, and let it cook slowly on the other side. I started the new one, and finished it. They took the order out, and by that time the other one was done. I put it on the hot window, and hoped for another order to come up... After about 5 or 6 minutes I figured it had been up for long enough so I threw it out. Right at that moment... i got an order for another one!

 

[StirBlue]

I got the hot idea to dip chicken liver in oil, roll in seasoned flour and deep fry. Liver has lots or even tons of moisture. They got hot inside and the oil acted like a seal, and they begin to explode. Hot grease balls! Bam!Bam!Bam! Run, Run for your life! Eventually got back into the kitchen and put a lid on the pot and turned off the heat. Could still hear the booms for a while. There were big ball size grease splatters all over the kitchen. Good thing I cook in small batches. Lucky it didn't cause a grease fire. This was the worst nightmare and the cleanup was endless.

 

[daisy]

I can say that both my first AND second marriages were big mistakes!

As for cooking disasters, my biggie wasn't exactly a mistake, as it happened. Everything turned out beautifully! BUT.....

Friend was visiting from interstate on business, a rare event, and came for dinner. I spent a lot of time preparing marinated chicken, a range of lovely salads, made an enormous cheesecake, blah blah. Went to a lot of trouble, and everything was in a state of utter perfection.

But when the friend sat down to the table, his face dropped to the floor. He had unusual taste preferences which I wasn't aware of, and there was NOTHING, absolutely nothing, on the table that he could eat! Not even the cheesecake!

He was very apologetic and polite, and we managed to laugh our way through another makeshift dinner, but underneath the veneer, I was one shattered woman!