I forgot to take a photo, but a picture is worth a thousand words. My saucepan was coated with a sticky black film that even persisted after a hot cycle in the dishwasher. What happened? Well, I had a simple recipe for breakfast couscous: chopped apple, dried apricots, cranberries, cinnamon, milk, and couscous. The recipe called for all ingredients to be boiled except for the couscous, which was supposed to be added right at the end, when the pot was taken off the burner. I was supposed to let the ingredients stand for five minutes, covered, with no heat.
I have the reading comprehension skills of a five-year-old with ADD, so instead, I put the couscous in with everything else and let the whole mess boil. I looked over at the pot and saw steam coming out of it. It hadn't been boiling that long, I thought, so everything should be fine. I opened the lid, spooned out some of the contents of the pot, and saw a bunch of black grit on the bottom. Yum.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
O Cauliflower, What Went Wrong?
Thursday, January 6, 2011
What's Wrong With This Dinner?
Tonight I'm initiating a new category of posts called "What's Wrong With This Dinner?" Let me give you the backstory behind tonight's disaster.
I had some frozen panko-breaded basa fillets, a tomato, an onion, an avocado, some cilantro, and some leftover rice.
I thought I would make some tomato-avocado salsa. I put some badly-diced tomatoes, onions, and avocados in a dish, and added olive oil, lemon juice, badly chopped cilantro and some salt. This actually would have been somewhat successful except the avocado was unripe. This unfortunate avocado had the peculiar defect of being both unripe and brown at the same time. I thought only overripe avocados suffered from brownness.
Then I tried to make some cilantro-garlic mayonnaise. I think I needed to have used more cilantro, and also, it would have helped if I'd used a blender.
The rice was also a problem. I don't know what I was thinking, exactly - maybe I was half-remembering some Spanish rice I'd eaten on some occasion, but this was definitely not it. I sauteed more badly-diced onion and tomato in some more olive oil. The heat must have been too high, because the onion was too browned. But the worst problem was a surfeit of white pepper. I've never had a problem with too much black pepper, but too much white pepper is particularly unpalatable. Someone should muzzle my right hand.
My husband, God bless him, ate it all.
I had some frozen panko-breaded basa fillets, a tomato, an onion, an avocado, some cilantro, and some leftover rice.
I thought I would make some tomato-avocado salsa. I put some badly-diced tomatoes, onions, and avocados in a dish, and added olive oil, lemon juice, badly chopped cilantro and some salt. This actually would have been somewhat successful except the avocado was unripe. This unfortunate avocado had the peculiar defect of being both unripe and brown at the same time. I thought only overripe avocados suffered from brownness.
Then I tried to make some cilantro-garlic mayonnaise. I think I needed to have used more cilantro, and also, it would have helped if I'd used a blender.
The rice was also a problem. I don't know what I was thinking, exactly - maybe I was half-remembering some Spanish rice I'd eaten on some occasion, but this was definitely not it. I sauteed more badly-diced onion and tomato in some more olive oil. The heat must have been too high, because the onion was too browned. But the worst problem was a surfeit of white pepper. I've never had a problem with too much black pepper, but too much white pepper is particularly unpalatable. Someone should muzzle my right hand.
My husband, God bless him, ate it all.
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