Here's What Not to Do in the Kitchen

-- I preface this entry by saying that I am a man, and as such I make no claims to speak for women. The advice contained herein and the assumptions it makes about ones kitchen etiquette and understanding applies solely to myself and those of the male specimen. --

I find myself teetering on the edge of one who loves to cook good food. I am dangerously close to falling right out of that classification and finding myself floundering in the murky ocean of natural disasters. Following is a list of what you should at all costs avoid to do in the kitchen. They are natural disasters, because naturally they'd be the disaster that followed their action. Following each bit of counsel is a real life story illustrating why certain things should be avoided (the stories are included for the unbelieving who won't take someone at the word)(oh yeah, and the names of those involved have been changed to protect the innocent and guilty).

1. Never ever ever operate the blender with the lid off while trying to force the ingredients down into the blade with a wooden spoon.

Now while this may sound pretty easily comprehended, I add that you most likely shouldn't use any sort of tool to force the blender ingredients into a rapidly rotating steel blade. I knew of a chap named P. Money who found himself trying to make pear puree for use in a food dehydrator--a fruit leather project. When the pear chunks insisted on floating above the blades, P. Money decided he was going to need to step in and convince those floaters otherwise. Now, as a gangster, P. Money was used to the adage that a 'big stick' is always best. Unfortunately as a married man he had abandoned his billy club and the only remaining wooden object in the home was one of his wife's best wooden spoons. Of course that would do. 'Ideal' he thought. So there it went, down went the pears, down went the spoon, and then up went the pears and up went the spoon--both in equally small pieces. The entire pear mix had to be abandoned due to wooden splinters throughout and P. Money had to admit the sorry events to his wife and note a lesson duly learned.

2. Cold water and hot glass should never find themselves together.

We knew another gentlemen who went by the name of Trick Mitchell (we know a lot of thugs). He got a little hasty after making a loaf of bread. The story still makes me cry that he had shown such patience in making the bread and then lost his patience in the home stretch. He pulled the glass bread pan out of the oven and flipped it to get out the loaf . . . nothing. The bread seemed insistent on staying inside the pan. Then Mr. Trick seemed to remember something about cold water shrinking warm objects -- so he tried it. As with P. Money, Mr. Trick lost the entire loaf to glass shards. His wife's beautiful glass pan exploded as soon as the water hit it and Mr. Trick had quite the mess to pick up--including his pride--from off the floor.

3. Never preheat a pan with nothing in it . . . and definately don't forget about the pan after doing so.

Another of our friends named, um . . . uh . . . what was his name again Lindsay? Patrick? I didn't remember that, that's the same name as me. Huh. Well, so we had nother friend named Patrick who thought that when a skillet recipe asked him to preheat the skillet it meant to do so empty. Then he forgot about the pan. When he finally remembered he flew to the oven and yanked the skillet right off . . . and the burner came along with it. The discovered damage was that the pan had gotten so hot the bottom began to melt and the burner started to come up into the pan. Inside, the previously teflon coated sides were now stainless steel and though he remembered preheating it empty, there was a dark powder all over the inside. Finally, the red outside of the skillet was now black and the formerly stainless steel lid was now a yellowish-gold color. It a was a crazy sight and I felt bad for him, but he learned his lesson.

4. Even if you do put something in a pan, don't forget about it!

The same sort of thing happened to our friend P. Diddy when he boiled water but forgot about it. The pan isn't with the family anymore. Enough said.

5. Even if a recipe calls for no flour . . . put flour in it.

I knew an LDS missionary named Elder Mitchell who found a quick and easy brownie recipe. It called for butter, sugar, some baking powder, cocoa, eggs, oil, and time. The result was a thin, black, brick like object that never did come out of the pan afterwards. Later another missionary told him about the flour thing.

Well, that's all my wisdom for today. I've seen a lot of crazy things in my time and have felt sorry for each of these guys. Maybe I'll give some more advice later, but let this all sink in first. Happy cooking! Safely of course.