Mistakes were made

I made a mistake.

I have been informed that I left a very important ingredient out of last week’s recipe. I honestly hope that no one was sorely disappointed because of my mistake. I will put the correct recipe in this week.

That said I know we all make mistakes and this reminded me of a few that I have made over the years.

 There have been quite a few, I am sure. Let me see if I can think of some. I am sure that most of my friends can think of more than I can, but I am sure I don’t have near enough room for them all.

Cooking mistakes probably make up the majority of my mistakes. Either forgetting to put an ingredient in, or using a wrong ingredient, or changing a recipe without first making it the way it was written. For example, I was making hamburger gravy and biscuits one Saturday when Marla and Ray were living with us. It was a go to for supper when we had been through a busy day. I had gotten tired of it always being the same and so that day I was looking through my spice rack and saw a small jar of turmeric. I am not sure I ever knew what it was used for, but I figured it might make the gravy taste good.

 I sprinkled a goodly amount in that gravy and stirred it in. To my chagrin, it turned that gravy a beautiful shade of green. I served it anyway, the kids and Rick were good sports and declared it really good, but I did get a rash of jokes about green eggs and ham after that.

Another time I actually followed a recipe but it didn’t turn out the way I thought it would. I was looking for another way to fix liver besides fried with onions and gravy. I found a recipe that sounded really good, kind of a sweet sour sauce on the liver. I cut the liver into pieces, marinated it according to the recipe, cooked it and made the sauce. Rick came home that night expecting some good old liver and onions with mashed potatoes and gravy and I served him this horrible mess of nasty tasting, tough, horrible liver.

Needless to say that liver went in the garbage and we had sandwiches for supper that night. That recipe went in the garbage. I never messed with liver and onions again. When we have liver and onions it is just that. No fancy recipes.

One more. When I was a kid and learning to cook, it was my chore to get up on Sunday mornings and make cinnamon rolls with biscuit dough. It was a favorite of my brothers, faster to make than the yeast dough ones. It was a recipe that a youngster of 10 could handle. I enjoyed doing it. 

When George moved to Denver, I hitched a ride with some cousins to go visit him and his wife Linda. While there I decided to fix the biscuit cinnamon rolls. I mixed them up, rolled them out and baked them. They came out like little cinnamon swirl hockey pucks. There was no way we could eat them. We took them to the zoo to feed the ducks and they sank so fast the ducks wouldn’t even try to eat them. That is when I learned about elevation having an effect on baked goods.

The Correct Recipe for Brazilian Cheese bread

2/3 cup oil

2/3 cup milk

2 eggs

1 scant teaspoon salt

2 cups tapioca starch

1 tablespoon Parmesan cheese.

Blend all ingredients until smooth. Pour into well sprayed mini muffin tins an bake at 350º for 20 minutes. This makes about 48 puffs. I usually half the recipe to make 24, then the dog and I eat them all.