Adventures in cooking (almost worthy of a bad bad bad)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Have you ever forgot something was in the oven when you preheated it, or maybe put something in a hot oven you shouldn’t have?

Some background;
Some of you may remember me mourning the loss of a local chain of grocery stores a while back, leaving only Albertsons, Walmart, Winco, and a host of boutique stores like trader joes or whole foods(all of those are no where near me enough to even bother with) and, lastly and leastly the other local chain of grocery stores, Ridleys.

All of these stores are too expensive/poor value, far away, weird layout and brands.

That left Ridleys. Cheap, new store in my town less than a mile away etc.

The lead up;
I’ve recently switched my grocery shopping from Ridleys to Walmart. I didn’t realize how incredibly cheap Ridleys was until I stopped at Walmart for something because at that time it was easier than going to Ridleys. Better produce (i was amazed based on experience) better quality, better brands, better…well everything really and for less money. Screw Ridleys, I sheepishly shop groceries at Walmart now even though it’s about 6 miles away.

The Excitement;
Grocery shopping with the vaderling a couple weeks ago. Bought some frozen pizzas. Walmart is far enough away that frozen stuff gets a little soft by the time we get home. Usually this isn’t a problem.
Last night, I was feeling almost quite literally dead on my feet by the time I got home from picking up the boy from his mom for the week. I tell him, you’ve been raised in the kitchen, your choices for dinner are pizza, macncheez, canned chili or ramens. Pizza it is. He preheats the oven, gets the pizza out and opened and the plastic wrap off. Oven dings and he pops it in.

Well, unbeknownst to him (and me, I tried to remain conscious, but was comatose on the sofa) during the trip from store to house, the pizza dough had softened enough that a large chunk of plastic was sort of stuck in the bottom of the pizza.

Today, I’m cleaning melted plastic out of the bottom of my oven. The heating element seems saveable, the racks are going to have to be replaced cause I ain’t cleaning those.

We’ve all had mishaps in the kitchen, right?

2

This guy sure did.

3

I was making hard-boiled eggs and something came up…

Well, when I got back into the kitchen, the pot was dry, the eggs had all exploded and we near a melt-down.

Idiot.

4

I have a Walmart pizza mishap, as well: We get the not-frozen pizzas from over by the deli area. They’re wrapped in plastic along with a round cardboard tray, then placed inside a fold-over delivery-type pizza box. The second time we got one, it was happily baking when I asked my wife if she remembered to remove the cardboard tray, because I know I didn’t. Nope; the tray rode it out. Didn’t seem to affect the pie one way or another. Think that means something? :astonished:

5

Maybe the tray is supposed to stay with the pizza during cooking? Papa Murphys take and bake pies are that way, heavy paper or light cardboard tray that stays with the pizza during cooking

6

Coach, that is a perfect example of, well a lot of things really, but for this thread, it’s a shining example of Things To Never EVER Put In The Oven

7

Nope, the instructions say remove the cardboard; of course, the instructions are on the bottom of the box. We just forgot the one time.

8

Ah, well that was lucky then

9

My mom used to store her Tupperware in her oven. Then…well, her new oven sure was nice!

10

I left a plastic handled spatula in the oven that I smelled long before I realized it was coming from the oven.
I say I left it in there. I have no memory of being so dumb.
But since I was alone in the house I had no one else to blame.
That small piece of plastic smelled up my house for weeks.
It finally burnt off in the self-cleaning cycle.

I got rid of all plastic handled spatulas after that.

mid-Daughter hung a dish towel on the oven handle and when she looked in the oven it flapped over into the oven. That was a smokey mess. We caught it before it actually flamed up. Micro fiber is some weird stuff. It kinda melted and scorched at the same time. Nasty smell.

Yep, @DorkVader, we’ve all done it. Numerous times.

11

My parents have used pressure cookers for years and never had a mishap.

I was at a friend’s house when her mother’s pressure cooker exploded. Cleaning green stuff (don’t remember what it was, except it was green) off the ceiling, light fixtures, cupboards, was not fun. It was not the first time, so I think it was her and not the pressure cooker.

When I was early teens I left a spoon in the mixer. Did a good number on the beaters, which had to be replaced. Haven’t done that again.

I prefer wooden utensils for the stove - they don’t scratch and they don’t melt. My parents made sure that I always stayed in the kitchen when I baked or cooked. This means that I probably avoided many of the common mishaps which happen when something is left unattended.

And I already mentioned in another thread that I have a talent for spilling water when draining pasta. Keeps the kitchen floor clean. :frowning:

12

I mentioned in a thread somewhere else recently about our Easter brunch this year. We usually have it at our house and I do most of the cooking, but because of COVID and other family health issues we ordered pre-made brunch from the grocery store and took it to my wife’s parents’ house. I turned on the oven to preheat so we could warm up the food, and I made a joke about checking the oven for the quilt. (A reference to “The Middle”.) No quilt, but there was a stack of Tupperware in there, so it’s a good thing I checked!

Thanksgiving is usually when we have our cooking adventures, mostly because too many people are in the kitchen trying to do too many things at once. Usually the casualty is the pecans I’m toasting for the stuffing (they burn really easily) but there was also the time my wife accidentally put cinnamon in the gravy instead of black pepper. And the year she decided at the last minute that I was making mashed cauliflower instead of mashed potatoes, when neither of us had ever made it before.

13

Went to reheat a cup of coffee in the microwave one day, not paying attention to the fact the mug had a gold leaf rim. I remembered sharpish when the microwave started arcing and sparking, making noises like a Tesla coil doing its thing. Had a couple of burn spots on the mug and the microwave seemed none the worse for wear but it sure make me run back to the kitchen in a hurry!

I was at my buddies place when I was in University and we decided after a night of carousing to make 3 AM tacos. I was hitherto unaware of the fact that taco shells are flammable, and burn like torches, until that night. We had pizza instead after the smoke cleared.

14

One night I got a call from a client site. I could hear the alarms in the background so I explained how to silence them and went right there. This was the data processing department main computer room of a large hospital. It seems that the IT guys decided they needed a break area with a microwave.

One guy brought a pizza from a restaurant for his lunch and stuck it in the microwave not realizing that it was foil lined. The microwave blew up and tripped the Halon 1301 fire suppression system for the data center. Three days and about $80,000.00 later the Halon system was back up and running. The break area was gone…

My boss also had a new bass boat

15

I usually roast a turkey in an oven bag for Thanksgiving. The turkey comes out perfect and in less time than roasting it without a bag. One year I had everything ready ahead of schedule. It was a rare, warm Minnesota Thanksgiving day. So while the turkey was in the oven, I took the dog for a quick walk all the while thinking how easily everything came together and I’d be able to relax for a bit before everyone arrived. When I came back home the kitchen was full of smoke! I opened the oven door and found that one of the corners of the oven bag had popped out of the pan and had a leak in it. Turkey drippings were spilling all over the bottom of the oven. Twenty people were about to arrive in a half hour and the house stunk to high heaven - it made my eyes water. Luckily the turkey was done, so I pulled it out of the oven and then had to open all of the windows, brought a window fan out of storage and set that up along with other fans. It all turned out ok, but what a panic. Needless to say, I had no down time.

After everyone left I took a look at the inside of the oven. The whole bottom was black, burnt on grease. And when I say burnt on, it was like a hard black glaze. I had to try and scrape up as much as I could before I turned on the self-cleaning function or I would have been right back to a house full of smoke.

I make sure those bags are tucked in tightly now.

16

My sister did the same. Very small kitchen, little storage. My nephews decided to warm up the oven for pizza. Flipped it on, went outside to toss around the football, heard the smoke detector going off. Stove, carpeting (yes, it was a carpeted kitchen), and the surrounding walls and ceiling were ruined.
Unfortunately, this was in an apartment building that was going to be razed three months later, so the property owner wouldn’t replace the stove.

Myself: Learned the hard way in Junior High HomeEc not to slice refrigerator cookies too thin, as they will catch on fire while in the oven. Here at home I learned when putting foil parcel packets fresh off the grill in the oven to keep warm, they really need to go on a lipped tray, otherwise any small tear will leak butter all over and create a tremendous mess. Oh, and that butter can explode in the microwave.

17

No harm was done, but I thought it interesting. Near the end of an October camping trip, I decided to reheat some Kraft Macaroni and Cheese in the RV microwave. It had been cooked the day before. After re-heating it, I forgot it was there and it remained in the microwave all winter after the RV was stored. The next spring I found the now 5-month-old bowl of mac and cheese in the microwave – and it looked perfect. If I hadn’t known how old it was I might have reheated it again to eat. It was spooky how well it held up. I wonder if it’s really food.

18

I knew a fellow who caused the evacuation of a hospital’s intensive care unit because they tossed a pack of popcorn into the break area microwave and walked off.

19

as a working electrician and fire alarm technician for 41 years, I can’t even try to calculate how many false alarms were caused by microwave popcorn.

20

Twenty years ago (or more), a buddy of mine had a party at his parents’ house while they were out of town. I brought my Vitamix blender, rum and frozen strawberry puree. I watched a party attendee put rum, ice & bright red puree into the blender and, in what seemed like slow motion and before I could say anything, reach for and flip the power switch without putting the bender lid on. If you didn’t know, a Vitamix blender from that time is basically a one and a half horsepower ceiling and cupboard painting device. Sorry!

Another blender accident (not the Vitamix) had to do with a batch of salsa verde. I’d blended all of the ingredients and the hot salsa was done. I pulled the blender bowl off the base and the threaded base part cracked and a quart and a half of scalding hot salsa hit the 4x6’ rug and my feet. I basically rolled up and tossed the rug. The shoes cleaned up.