Saturday, October 03, 2009

Dinner disaster-piece

I have been planning tonight's supper for a few weeks.  My Dad and his wife, Tanya, were planned to arrive in time for supper to begin their 5 day stay with The Guy and me.  Tanya is a good cook and I wanted to do something that would be hearty and impressive.  I thought of my mom's version of Hamburger Soup and I knew it would be just the thing.

A week ago, I sat down and went through the ingredients to make sure I had everything I needed.  I planned out when I would need to start things and how long it would take to cook.  I shopped, I planned, and I plotted.

This morning came and at 11am, I could be found chopping onions, browning meat, and readying the soup pot.  I chopped the veggies, opened tins of diced tomatoes, and prepared the soup.  I finished in record time and sat around twiddling my thumbs waiting for the time when I had to turn on the stove for it's two hour simmer session.

Technically, I didn't twiddle my thumbs.  I made cookies, did 5 loads of laundry, cleaned the tub, walked the dog, planned the bisquits, and read a book.  It was a long 3 hours.

Finally, the time to start the soup came.  I turned the stove on to simmer and walked away.  A couple of hours later, I came to check on it.  The fat from the meat seemed to be congealing more than I remembered it doing in Mom's soup.  It also didn't smell right.  I thought I was just remembering it poorly, but maybe the heat wasn't up high enough.  I cranked the heat up a notch and carried on to make the bisquits.

The bisquits did not go as easily as I had planned.  I used too much moisture and not enough flour.  I ended up having to readjust the flour but that caused me to over-kneed.  They looked nice when they came out, but they were about 1/4 inch high instead of 1 inch.  Ah well, I will have to practice more often.

We sat down to eat in record time.  I served everyone up a serving and settled in to eat.  Dad was half way through his soup when I took my first bite.  It was ice cold.  ICE COLD.  The soup that had been simmering away all afternoon was cold as can be.  I panicked.  I threw everyone's soup in the microwave and apologized over and over again.

I took the soup pot off the table and put it back on the stove.  As I went to turn on the stove I realized what I had done.  I had turned on the wrong element.  I had simmered nothing for 2 1/2 hours. 

This is what happens when I try and cook.  And this is why I order out.

8 comments:

  1. Oh man! I'm sorry. But that was awesome.

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  2. I just want to CRY for you! I have done similar STUPID things ... only, of course, when it matters the most. I'm sure your soup was delicious but all you could think about was how much more delicious it would have been had it actually simmered! On the bright side, we all need nightmare cooking stories to tell about of first few weeks of marriage. You and I must just "forget" to tell the part that we'd been cooking for many years before actually walking down the aisle!

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  3. now I want to go make soup... :)

    love you!

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  4. Oh noes!!! I do that ALL THE TIME. Never for a dinner party, mind you, but I can well imagine. Well, A for effort. :)

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  5. That is some funny stuff! Didn't feel funny at the time, but seriously... hilarious! The best part? This is one of those stories you'll never live down.

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  6. Actually the soup was good (almost) cold with crunchy veggies. You need to work on that version and come up with a new recipe.

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  7. I thought it was pretty funny myself. If you can't laugh at your own stupidity, whose can you laugh at?

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  8. I laugh at my husband's with some regularity. :) Awesome story.

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Crap monkies say "what?"