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cooking


torakris

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Because I like to cook and all of my friends know it I am constantly being asked for cooking advice, recipes, etc

I don't mind at all and love sharing my recipes and knowledges, but occassionally they ask or do something that just gets me rolling on the floor, not in front of them of course! :biggrin:

I have a friend who is always asking me for my recipes, so I give them to her and then she calls me up later and says hers didn't come out the same and she is mad at me for giving her a messed up recipe. After talking it through it turn out that for my white cake she substituted margarine for the butter, whole wheat flour for the white, some "healthy" brown sugar for the white, left out the baking powder because she doesn't like to use "chemicals", and didn't use the vanilla because her small son was going to eat and she didn't want to put alcohol in it!

Just last week a woman who I teach cooking privately to, called me in a panic from the supermarket becasue she was going to make a braised pork dish with orange and sherry and she couldn't find where they sold the orange zest! When i told her she would have to make it by herself, she panicked and said "ohmy God, how do I do that!?"

Any other stories of clueless friends?

Kristin Wagner, aka "torakris"

 

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I was walking a friend through a gumbo recipe over the telephone. I specifically told him to start with the dark roux using flour and peanut oil or fresh lard. He called back saying his roux didn't smell good like mine. In fact, it smelled vile. He had used EVOO and whole wheat flour to make it "healthier".

Linda LaRose aka "fifi"

"Having spent most of my life searching for truth in the excitement of science, I am now in search of the perfectly seared foie gras without any sweet glop." Linda LaRose

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Six of us at a resort up north. Five of us had gone fishing very early in the morning, caught a mess of sunnies and perch, and filleted them.

Out walks Kay; it is 11:00 am, at a fairly primative resort. Kay is in full make-up and a silk dress.

We're all ready to go for a swim, so Kay asks what she can do. We suggest that she breads the fish because we'll be ready to eat the minute we do our shore-island-shore swim.

We return, dripping. Kay is sitting at the table with a loaf of bread, wrapping each fillet in a slice of bread, and securing said slice of bread with a toothpick.

Kay was clueless about many things. Her boyfriend said that he had only "uncovered one talent." :wub:

Susan Fahning aka "snowangel"
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This is a small thing, but it amazes me that some people still don't know that when you serve pasta, you should sauce it first rather than bringing a pot of sauce and a bowl of congealing pasta to the table. Sometimes people say they know this but that they want everyone to be able to sauce to taste. Well, then sauce lightly and offer additional sauce. Then these same people ask for tips to keep their pasta from sticking. Put sauce on it!

Matthew Amster-Burton, aka "mamster"

Author, Hungry Monkey, coming in May

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I've been told that Fettuccine all'Alfredo really sucks when made with the crap in the round green shaker can. I didn't ask nor wanted to know what was substituted for the cream and butter.

PJ

"Epater les bourgeois."

--Lester Bangs via Bruce Sterling

(Dori Bangs)

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I have a friend who for years INSISTED to me that bacon didn't come from pigs. So I asked him "then where does it come from"? He says "some non-pork bacon animal" he doesn't know the name of.

Of course he's Jewish, so I just chalked it up to creative denial.

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Wrote this story somewhere else, but it was so disapointing, I'm doing it again. A friend of mine made a gorgeous pork roast. The next thing I knew, she had cut off everything brown and left a thin layer of gelatinous, white fat. There was almost no fat on it in the first place. :sad:

Needless to say, it was dry and tasteless. :angry:

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I have a friend who for years INSISTED to me that bacon didn't come from pigs. So I asked him "then where does it come from"? He says "some non-pork bacon animal" he doesn't know the name of.

Suuuuure, pork and bacon and sausage come from the same animal. A wonderful, magical animal...

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I have a friend who for years INSISTED to me that bacon didn't come from pigs. So I asked him "then where does it come from"? He says "some non-pork bacon animal" he doesn't know the name of.

Suuuuure, pork and bacon and sausage come from the same animal. A wonderful, magical animal...

Homer? Zat you?

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Any other stories of clueless friends?

Not too long ago I was asked for suggestions for a salad and - taking into account this guys cooking ability - I said Tuna would be an easy main ingredient.

He said, "Tuna! I never thought of that. That's just like fish, isn't it?"

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Wrote this story somewhere else, but it was so disapointing, I'm doing it again.  A friend of mine made a gorgeous pork roast.  The next thing I knew, she had cut off everything brown and left a thin layer of gelatinous, white  fat.  There was almost no fat on it in the first place. :sad:

Needless to say, it was dry and tasteless. :angry:

At a family pig roast my wife's cousin threw away all the skin! (I picked a bunch out of the trash).

Also, after about six hours he checked the internal tempurature of the meat. I t was 190. I said take it off now. He decided to cook it for 2 more hours, to "make sure". The pork was mush :angry: .

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My ex (not a good cook) tried to make homemade cookies and used thick soy sauce instead of molasses.

The sad part is that it probably helped more than it hurt.

Did she purposely substitute thick soy sauce (kecap manis?) or did she think she was using molasses?

I have a dear friend I love very much who doesn't understand the concept of preheating an oven. She puts whatever item into the oven while the oven is cold; then, she turns on the oven. She and her husband tell me that it's a waste of electricity to preheat. They're also unwilling to pay for decent knives, yet they wonder how I can chop so much more quickly and precisely whenever I bring over my own knives (and mine aren't even close to top-of-the-line). For someone who scored quite low on the snob test, this sounds awfully snobbish.

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My ex (not a good cook) tried to make homemade cookies and used thick soy sauce instead of molasses.

The sad part is that it probably helped more than it hurt.

Did she purposely substitute thick soy sauce (kecap manis?) or did she think she was using molasses?

I have a dear friend I love very much who doesn't understand the concept of preheating an oven. She puts whatever item into the oven while the oven is cold; then, she turns on the oven. She and her husband tell me that it's a waste of electricity to preheat. They're also unwilling to pay for decent knives, yet they wonder how I can chop so much more quickly and precisely whenever I bring over my own knives (and mine aren't even close to top-of-the-line). For someone who scored quite low on the snob test, this sounds awfully snobbish.

She had watched me make cookies many times for my nieces and nephews - she just didn't pay attention to the label.

The cookies were for a going-away party at "her" job so I let it slide.

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I have a dear friend I love very much who doesn't understand the concept of preheating an oven. She puts whatever item into the oven while the oven is cold; then, she turns on the oven.

My cousin does that too! She commented once that my mini quiches turned out better than hers. Hers were dark on the outside and not heated through. Later, when we made them at her house, I found out why!

Practice Random Acts of Toasting

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A friend of my sister didn't know the difference between a clove of garlic and a head.

Hmm, come to think of it a friend of mine does know the difference, but still tends toward putting in a head's worth when only a few cloves are called for.

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A friend of my sister didn't know the difference between a clove of garlic and a head.

Hmm, come to think of it a friend of mine does know the difference, but still tends toward putting in a head's worth when only a few cloves are called for.

Jeez -- I had classmates it restaurant school just like that. Even at the end of the course! :rolleyes:

But is putting in a head of garlic instead of a few cloves really a problem? Not always. :laugh:

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Apocryphal story:

Newlywed wife sends hubby to the grocery store. She puts white potatoes on the shopping list. He returns with everything on the list but potatoes.

When asked why he explains," They only had brown ones".

:laugh::laugh::laugh:

Kitchen Kutie

"I've had jutht about enough outta you!"--Daffy Duck

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