Lately, I've been enjoying cooking a lot, so much so that I'm thinking about taking a class to learn a few new things. This new hobby of mine has had me leafing through cookbooks that have sat on my bookshelves largely untouched for two years, and in doing so, I came across a Southern Sideboards recipe for something called Buttermilk Chicken that I wanted to try.
Here's me in the kitchen. I'm actually cutting up some chicken in this photo, but I look like I'm cutting up a random collection of stuff in the wrought iron plate holder to my right, and looking kind of evil while I'm at it. Nonetheless, here I am:
So last Tuesday night, I made the Buttermilk Chicken. It's not a complicated dish, and basically once you assemble your various ingredients in the baking pan (in my case, it was a glass Pyrex baking dish.), you just put it in the oven. That's what I did, and as it got closer to time for the dinner to be done, I opened the oven to check on the dinner. Then, I closed to oven and turned around to get some oven mitts so that I could take the pan out. But I never got that far, because at that moment, there was this enormous shattering sound IN THE OVEN, and I opened it to find this sight:
Yes, the Pyrex dish, supposedly made from the most indestructible stuff on earth, EXPLODED in my OVEN. It was disgusting, with chicken and sauce and glass shards being turned into a cloud of black smoke. There was really nothing to do until the oven cooled off, so we got takeout. But it did occur to me to be glad that I was not holding the stupid dish when it exploded, and the next night when I was writing an email to Ryan, who as you may recall, is stationed in Africa right now with the Marines, I told him about my culinary brush with potentially moderate injury.
When Ryan wrote back to me, with his usual sense of humor, I remembered why you never tell "I almost got hurt" stories to your brothers who are in the armed services: Because you're always going to wind up sounding like a weenie. Ryan wrote this to me:
"Your adventures in the kitchen sound pretty perilous. I'm glad that chicken IED didn't get you."
Yes, to quote George W., "There is madmen and there are terror" in my oven. And even Improvised Explosive Devices. But i will stay the course. Because I still want some Buttermilk Chicken, and a new Pyrex dish, too.
Comments (11)
haha haley keep trying. i want to know if you and dan have gone to see borat... because hannah and audrey may have taken your mom to see it. i had no part in it. i was in oklahoma.
here's a picture of my family i did over thanksgiving break.
http://danielmeigs.com/images/meigsfamily.jpg
Posted by daniel | November 30, 2006 12:43 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 00:43
oh my goodness! how in the world did that ever happen?! i'm just glad you weren't holding it.
Posted by Kelly | November 30, 2006 4:41 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 04:41
Oh my goodness!!!!! In all my adventures in cooking, this has never happened to me....or anyone I know. I wonder if the dish had a little crack in it? I got a Pampered Chef stonware pan last year for a thank you gift and I love it so much! You may want to think about getting one. I know it must have been a huge mess to clean...but I couldn't help laughing when I read this....sorry. You know I love ya!
Shanelle
Posted by Shanelle | November 30, 2006 7:12 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 07:12
How terrifying (and hilarious)! I'm so glad you didn't get hurt (and I mean that)!
Posted by Jennifer | November 30, 2006 8:41 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 08:41
Hey Daniel! Dan saw Borat, and was kind of horrified, so I tried to tell the girls not to do that. I talked to them the night they said they were going to go. I reccomended Stranger Than Fiction, which is great. Oh well. They don't listen to me. But they should. :)
Posted by Haley | November 30, 2006 10:56 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 10:56
I had something similar happen once. I was making stuffed peppers and when I took the pyrex dish out of the oven, only part of it came out. It had cracked in half. I blame in on my roommate at the time though. I had the dish sitting on the stove top and for some reason she turned on the burner under it. So I think that hurt the integrity of the pyrex or cracked it or something. There was no explosion, but quite an adventure none-the-less. Glad you didn't get hurt!
Maybe we could take a cooking class together? :)
Posted by Kate :) | November 30, 2006 11:18 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 11:18
I had something similar happen once. I was making stuffed peppers and when I took the pyrex dish out of the oven, only part of it came out. It had cracked in half. I blame in on my roommate at the time though. I had the dish sitting on the stove top and for some reason she turned on the burner under it. So I think that hurt the integrity of the pyrex or cracked it or something. There was no explosion, but quite an adventure none-the-less. Glad you didn't get hurt!
Maybe we could take a cooking class together? :)
Posted by Kate :) | November 30, 2006 11:19 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 11:19
I had something similar happen once. I was making stuffed peppers and when I took the pyrex dish out of the oven, only part of it came out. It had cracked in half. I blame in on my roommate at the time though. I had the dish sitting on the stove top and for some reason she turned on the burner under it. So I think that hurt the integrity of the pyrex or cracked it or something. There was no explosion, but quite an adventure none-the-less. Glad you didn't get hurt!
Maybe we could take a cooking class together? :)
Posted by Kate :) | November 30, 2006 11:21 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 11:21
yeah we saw stranger than fiction the other night, and i was really satisfied. it was a very pleasant movie.
Posted by daniel | November 30, 2006 11:30 AM
Posted on November 30, 2006 11:30
That's awful, Haley! Yikes... (I'm giving you the sympathy the Marines apparently couldn't provide. lol.) I've never heard of a Pyrex explosion before. I had an 8x8 Pyrex dish fall of the roof of my traveling car (oops, my fault), get chipped, and it still works just fine. So who knows. The chicken sounds like a yummy recipe. Do you dare try it again?
Posted by Rebecca | November 30, 2006 2:55 PM
Posted on November 30, 2006 14:55
Please thank your brothers for me.
Posted by sabs | December 3, 2006 6:14 PM
Posted on December 3, 2006 18:14