Here is a perfect recipe for when you’re cooking for people you don’t like or just have a thing for carcinogenic food. In just 4 easy steps you too can ruin countless recipes.
Ingredients (necessary to have all the below within a 7 day period):
- Start a new job
- Return from an interstate holiday the day before starting said job
- Purchase a second hand car
- Commit to baking at least two batches of muffins and some muesli bars for a food swap
- 1 broken timer
- 1 faulty smoke alarm (though, to be fair, I’m quite glad the smoke alarm hasn’t being going off every second day)
Step 1: Upon returning from an interstate holiday (the day before starting a new job) commit to baking most evenings. Insist you are invincible and, most probably, Wonder Woman. Watch. Me. Go.
It helps it you can get cocky and start challenging yourself to mixing entire batches of muffins in the space of two songs. Which, for the record I totally can do. I didn’t say anything about the cooking process.
This is where I was last week… maybe all the sun has ruined my ability to bake?
Step 2: Pay no attention when putting oven on (it is a race against the CD player after all) and accidentally set to grill, not oven.
Step 4: Ignore the smell of burnt toast in the house and play with your iPhone instead. You’re up with the new technology after all. You’re even using the timer feature, no need to replace that old broken timer that has gotten you through years of cooking – no sir-ee!
When the smell does become more noticeable it’s probably best to check on the muffins. If, by this stage you’ve successfully burnt them, just take all the burnt top off and just keep cooking them. See below carnage. We don’t hold on ceremony here at Clever muffin!
Half way through the burnt-top removal process. Discarded burnt tops below.
Be pleased with your efforts. I think the below muffins are still perfectly fine. You are invincible and can multi-task. Repeat.
Here are some muesli bars I also burnt to smithereens this week. I tried to just cut off the burnt bits (below) but almost broke a tooth on the more OK looking bits. So no rescuing them, straight in the bin.
With this batch I found the real trick was using my iPhone to look up the recipe and also using it as a timer.
When the timer goes off to tell me to turn them around or take them out I just ignore it because I’m doing something else.
Brilliant.
After this crazy week of new jobs, car shopping and the constant smell of burning in my kitchen I decided to make a non-bake dessert on Saturday when we had a friend over. My boyfriend kindly made lasagne for the main course – or maybe he just didn’t want to let me near the oven – but dessert I thought I could do.
Thought I could do.
I remembered Frugal Feeding, a fellow blogger, recently putting up a post of Truffles (visit his site for instructions, it’s a nice recipe). Well, I did OK. Except for the white chocolate you need to melt to drizzle on top.
Yea. I burnt it. Should have known. Chocolate is one of the easiest things to burn. I’ve even written about how important it is to never walk away from melting chocolate previously.
I didn’t burn the chocolate so badly I couldn’t use it, but it never got crunchy, it was strangely chewy.
My guest even commented that the chewy topping was a really awesome contrast against the rich chocolate. How did I do that he asked…
Ah, I just have a little thing I’ve been doing this week with food, I replied.
Let’s hope it’s short lived.
