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| I introduce to you my nemesis - Eggs |
My sister is an awesome baker but she's still in-training as a cook. I'm the opposite way, a much better cook than baker which is about par for the course in an Italian fam, it makes it so we can make a nice full dinner together. She can alter baking recipes with panache which is impressive because it's much harder to alter a baking recipe than a cooking recipe due to the science aspect of it. At my vampire Halloween dinner party (yes.) she was sorrowfully remarking that she didn't think she'd ever be a good cook because she fucks up pancakes. A bunch of people (myself included) chimed in that pancakes are deceptively difficult to make and to do silver dollar sized until she got better at it. It took me years to make full sized pancakes. Meatballs were tricksy too.
But however experienced or inexperienced you may be as a cook, everyone has a few things that elude them no matter how hard they try.
Mine are:
* Lentils
* Frying anything like chicken pieces or chicken fried steak
* Eggs (I can soft boil with the best of them but hard boiling is not good, scrambling is okay, sunny side up is mostly a lost cause, omelets are a lost cause and I've never made a frittata or quiche I really wanted to eat)
* Baking anything that is more complicated than a box mix (exception: Madelines)
What are yours?
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10 comments:
Scallops. I cannot cook scallops so that they can be used as anything other than pencil erasers. I have no problem with any other shellfish. Of course, having been traumatized by scallops as a kid, I refuse to eat them. Or cook them so anyone else can eat them, evidently.
I grew up with pancakes, so I was surprised that someone would have trouble with them.
I'm not sure what I have trouble making. Now I have to think about that.
I'm also surprised someone would have trouble with pancakes. And eggs for that matter. Both I had to make every weekend for the family so I got a lot of practice. My favorites is sunny side up! The key is to make sure you use a little oil (not butter) when doing it. The right pan also makes a difference. And wait for it to heat up enough. Putting the egg in too early doesn't begin to fry it and it makes your life just a wee bit harder.
What I have problem with is cooking roasts. I can season them well, but for some reason they always end up tough. I do cook them slow but that doesn't seem to help.
Most of these things simply take practice. Having said that, I am a pretty good cook, but for many years I had trouble making edible noodles. Not the DIY kind, the ones that come from a bag and go into the boiling water. ^^ I am still careful when it comes to making dead animal other than chicken or fish, but I have gotten better with that. Next thing I want to try is making salt-encrusted roast beef.
soda bread...*never* even close to edible!
Mine used to be bread, it would never rise, ever. And I created these uh, big square hockey pucks (I am Canadian) that we could use as door stops. It remained elusive for a long time, I was 47 before suddenly the trick to it came out. Elusive may not be forever, but yes I too had trouble with pancakes and several other baked things, although I could whip up a full coarse roast beef dinner, perfect Yorkshire pudding and all from the time I was 10.
I have the unfortunate tendency to burn the rice. Also, possibly because I grew up with an electric griddle, I tend to burn the pancakes when I cook them in an actual frying pan.
Also, it took a few mishaps for me to realize that salt and fat are ingredients in things (like potato soup, um) for a reason.
Doing vegan gluten-nut-soy-free baking (as in: not apple crisp, but something that requires a binding agent) eludes me to this day.
I found a pretty good method for hard boiling eggs - put the eggs in a pan of cold water and bring the pan to a boil, remove the pot from the burner and let the eggs sit for about 20 minutes. put the eggs into some cold water and let them cool down before putting them back in the carton and storing them in the fridge. Always works for me.
@ Lavanah - lol, love it!
@ Katie - I know, it's weird right? But cooking things like meat, etc haven't ever really been a problem for me.
@ Salem - I'm guessing it's because I make them less frequently? I don't know, it's a weird quirk. Full roasted chicken, no prob! Eggs? Eeeeeeh. ;p
@ Diandra - That's awesome about the noodles! Dead Animals That Can Kill You if Not Cooked Properly were scary to me when I first started out and we ate mostly vegetarian at the time so it took a bit to get the hang of.
@ petoskystone - Hee! Bread is tricky!
@ Ember - At least you had a use for the ones that didn't turn out right ;)
@ birchtreemaiden - I burn rice too!
@ Michelle - I've tried that method, they still come out weird for me some times for some reason.
Maybe its because I can rarely afford to buy steaks, but I can't cook a slab of meat to safe my life! It's so embarrassing. Even my culinarily inept brother can turn out a perfect medium rare with no problem. Me? I end up fretting with thermometers and hovering over the grill and destroying everything.
Also, Asian meats for stir fries. I'm still working on slicing the meat evenly and in the right orientation. I just learned that marinating the meat in soy sauce and a teaspoon of baking soda does wonders for getting the taste and texture I want, though.
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