Dinner's Ready!

Oh my! I don't think I have ever had more epic fails in the kitchen than I did this week. It was bad...real bad. I'm talking doors and windows open, smoke alarm going off, and a smog-filled kitchen (as my Husband so lovingly described it).

It all started when the Pioneer Woman (see http://thepioneerwoman.com to see what I'm talking about) introduced me to a recipe that looked to delicious to resist. They were onion strings. I love these things, and the idea that I could actually make them made my heart skip a few beats. I would no longer have to wait until my Husband took me out to get these delicious treats.

I don't have a fry daddy, because we try to avoid anything fried but that was no biggie. The recipe said that I didn't need one, I just could make my own using a pot and some oil. But there was one item I was missing...a candy thermometer. You see, you were supposed to be monitoring the temperature of the oil so it didn't get to hot. That is where I got a bit cocky. I thought it was no big deal-I could just monitor it on my own and "guess" at them temperature.

So I made the delicious little things. I made my own buttermilk, sliced my onions with the greatest food processor on the planet, and created a beautiful flour coating. Once the onions were coated in the flour, it was showtime. I dunked them in the hot oil waiting to see the flour turn to golden, crunchy perfection. That is not what happened.

They immediately turned black. I mean the blackest black you have ever seen. And the smoke. Oh my gosh the smoke. It was everywhere. Oh boy was it thick too. My eyes were watering, my Husband was heckling me, and I was just upset that I wasn't going to get any onion strings. Every window and every door was wide open. The fans were turned on high, and we had to literally fan the smoke out of our apartment.

I not only set off the downstairs alarm, but the upstairs alarm as well. Good thing we have a townhome or our upstairs neighbors would have been evacuating as well. It was bad. So bad. To make matters worse, I didn't stop there. I decided to try another recipe. It was just a fail. Not an epic fail like this one. But this is enough confessions for today. I'll leave my next failure for another day. Moral of the story: If they say you need a candy thermometer, just believe them.