SO... a story of world-class, grand-champion mega-FAIL for you to marvel at me. And what an IDIOT I can be. And it involves cooking!
So I'm making a quiche-like main dish, which involves the usual suspects: Cheese, onion, some flour (and another spice or two) and lots of milk. The cheese and onion are waiting patiently in the baking pan for the milk etc. to get mixed up. Like an idiot (but only a minor one, so far) I used the stand-up mixer to mix this up, full well knowing that the beater doesn't really get down to the bottom of the bowl, so the flour will wind up stuck to the sides. So I carefully scrape it off, and did I mention that I'm somewhat tired as I do this? Anyway, it all goes into the baking dish.
Those of you with a clue will be thinking, "
Gee, where are the eggs?" which didn't occur to me until I stared at the mix wondering what seemed wrong. Check the recipe...
Ooops. Four eggs.
D'OH!
So I agonized for a while about whisking them separately, and then somehow mixing them in with the stuff in the dish already, but then decided the heck with
that and (carefully!) poured the whole mess back into the mixer after breaking the four eggs in, and using a knife to bust up the yolks.
That all mixed fine, went back into the pan (after getting strings/strands of grated cheese off the beater) and then into the oven.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand... that little voice at the back of my head kept wondering if something wasn't
quite right... and sure enough, check the recipe again...
Ooooops. Half a cup of parmesan!
D'OH!
Pulled it out of the oven (at least I remembered to use potholders, it had only been in a minute or so, but a 400-degree oven does amazing things) and dug out the parmesan. Which was blobby, but not TOO badly, and so I measured a by-golly-pretty-dang-close-but-generous-of-course half cup, and distributed it more-or-less evenly over everything. Then spent a minute or two (A) breaking up clumps and (B) distributing it more or less evenly and (C) sloshing it beneath the egg-n-milk mixture so it wouldn't just burn on top.
Sigh...
But here's the good part: It turned out really good! And it's what I wanted to say when this thread first started: MANY recipes don't really need super-exact measurements, or super-exact following of steps. So improvise, try stuff out, it'll probably be okay.
But before we ate it, I felt like the last panel in
this comic. Without, you know, the blonde hair.