Cooking Disasters Thread

[SummerRain]

Sometimes there's a lot of pressure to be a good cook - especially if you're cooking for others, friends, family, etc. I know that when my baking goes wrong and it's for a special occasion or get together, it's fustrating! If I slave over something in the kitchen, and the person I've made it for doesn't like it, I'm not going to lie - I'm hurt!

So I thought we'd have a thread to gripe, moan and commiserate about baking and cooking going wrong. Pictures welcome!

 

[spottygiraffe]

Great idea for a thread. Wish I had taken a photo of my attempt at making porridge out of bran this morning. It tasted as bad as it looked! It was a texture thing -yuk.

 

[Everleigh]

I always have a habit of leaving one ingredient out of a recipe.Sometimes it could be an insignificant ingredient then it's not so bad but if it's a spinach tofu quiche and I left the spinach out it could possibly go horribly wrong.Most of the time I catch it before it's cooked then I can still add what I left out but I did have at few things go wrong this month already.

 

[SummerRain]

Haha I over chilli things a lot, once I used several scotch bonnets in a recipe not realising they were much hotter than the chilli required in the recipe. It was inedible!

 

[AeryFairy]

I was making chilli a couple of weeks ago and could not for the life of me get it to taste right at the end when I was adding the last bits of seasoning... Then I realised I hadn't put any onion in it at the start

 

[ledboots]

Haha I over chilli things a lot, once I used several scotch bonnets in a recipe not realising they were much hotter than the chilli required in the recipe. It was inedible!

I have made too-spicy chili too. If you quarter a few potatoes and cook them in it for awhile, they soak up some of the heat, then you can take them out of the less-spicy chili. .

 

[RascalsMom]

I can't seem to ever cook frozen vegetables to be decent. I rarely buy them, but sometimes it's a good way to save money. But they're always mushy!

 

[RascalsMom]

Is anyone else horrible at keeping track of the amounts of things they add to food when throwing things together? Then if I make something decent, I can't replicate it.

 

[SummerRain]

I'm even sillier than that, I have a recipe I know tastes wonderful, start changing things around, and make something vile. I made avacado pasta salad last week, put in lime juice instead of lemon, and thought maybe olive oil would go nicely also... I turned something delicious into something genuinely inedible. My better half said "... what did you do to this?!".

 

[RascalsMom]

I do that sometimes, too. Can't leave well enough alone!

 

[thefadedone]

I have a recipe I know tastes wonderful, start changing things around, and make something vile.

I do that a lot. It usually happens because I make something amazing and I know I'll want more of it, so I will keep adding more stuff to it and end up ruining it.

I can't seem to ever cook frozen vegetables to be decent. I rarely buy them, but sometimes it's a good way to save money. But they're always mushy!

I recently discovered that letting the bag thaw first in the fridge helps cut down on the mushiness factor.

 

[RascalsMom]

I'll try that!!

 

[KLS52]

Is anyone else horrible at keeping track of the amounts of things they add to food when throwing things together? Then if I make something decent, I can't replicate it.

This is me, although I just recently started to take written notes.

Or, I print a recipe off of the Internet, turns out to be a keeper, and then I lose it.

 

[RascalsMom]

I spent hours baking

Fudge - 12 hours in the fridge, 2 hours in the freezer and it's still just melted goo

Gingerbread cookies - bland tasting & over cooked

Oatmeal cookies - barely any nutmeg in them, yet that's all you taste.

Snowball cookies - bland.

I tried really hard, these were supposed to be holiday gifts.

 

[thefadedone]

I spent hours baking

Fudge - 12 hours in the fridge, 2 hours in the freezer and it's still just melted goo

Gingerbread cookies - bland tasting & over cooked

Oatmeal cookies - barely any nutmeg in them, yet that's all you taste.

Snowball cookies - bland.

I tried really hard, these were supposed to be holiday gifts.

Hmm..maybe your taste buds are off. Did you have someone else try them ?

 

[SummerRain]

I spent hours baking

Fudge - 12 hours in the fridge, 2 hours in the freezer and it's still just melted goo

Gingerbread cookies - bland tasting & over cooked

Oatmeal cookies - barely any nutmeg in them, yet that's all you taste.

Snowball cookies - bland.

I tried really hard, these were supposed to be holiday gifts.

Oh no. I agree, try them on somebody else, perhaps you're overly-critical of the cookies?

 

[KLS52]

Oh, sorry RascalsMom. Such a disappointment when that happens. All that hard work and expense, too. Can any of them be iced/frosted? Maybe you can make icing with extra flavoring to make up for the ones that are bland. Or even try dipping some in chocolate?

 

[RascalsMom]

My fiancé seems to think they're all wonderful..
But can he be trusted?

 

[SummerRain]

sounds promising! I am always way more critical of my baking than other people (are about my baking).

 

[thefadedone]

My fiancé seems to think they're all wonderful..
But can he be trusted?

Like SummerRain said, I think you are being over critical. I bet they taste fabulous!

I was making two pumpkin pies, cranberry-pomegranate sauce, roasted chickpeas, brownies, and cooking my lunch and dinner all at once on Sunday. I like to cook multiple things when I have my oven on to save on electricity. I had so much going on that I didn't realize till later that I forgot to put one of the pies in the oven. I had even put it in the fridge without baking it. This morning I was wondering why it looked funny. It's baking now.