In the Kitchen
Recently I have been exploring my abilities as a chef. Not so much to my suprise I am pretty good. So far I have successfully made chicken cordon bleu, a great batch of french fries, spaghetti(not hard, I know), pancakes (take time to master), and various other little things that are not hard. My not so great concoctions...guacumole and my second batch of French fries. We'll start with the guac. It wouldn't have been bad had I not started off reading a recipe for guacumole salsa which requires that chopped onions be added rather than food processed onions if any at all. So I ended up with something I would call onions with smooshed up avacados. I don't like onions ever really so I considered this dish mostly a failure. I had onion breath from about 7 p.m. when I first tasted the "guac" until I woke up in the morning. That quickly reminded me of my dislike for the onion.
Now lets talk about the complete failure of french fry mission 2. It wasn't so much that the fries were slightly over done that made this mission a complete failure...it was the events following preparation of the potatoes that we're still dealing with that gets the grade of big fat "F"! Here it goes...Sunday evening: "Mmmm...french fries," my pregnant taste buds made up their mind and there was no turning back. I peeled the potatoes over the sink rather than the trash this time thinking, we have a disposal, it'll enjoy some potato skins this evening. Not true. As I washed the skins down the growling drain I realized the water was tornadoing around in a very unnatural fashion. "What's wrong?" Matt asks. "Oh nothing...there is just a lot of water in there," I reply confidently hoping that everything would be O.K.. With the potatos cut into perfect french fry shape I began to fry. Well, I guess the oil may have been a bit too hot because like I previously mentioned, most of the fries were slightly overdone and that is the only thing I could attribute to the potato scented haze that filled our 1 bedroom apartment, not to mention the extreme burning sensation Matt and I were both experiencing in our eyes. So after eating disappointing batch two Matt checked out the sink that wasn't seeming to drain...hummmm?!?!
"Did I break it?" I queried.
"Not sure yet," he replied sounding a bit dismayed.
We had discovered a leak about a week before this whole incident but nothing too severe. So he takes apart the pipes to find nothing but potato clogging the way. If our sink was human the risk of heart attack was 100% with death as the only outcome. We knew this was a project beyond us and called in the maintenance men who came on Monday to routinely snake the drain...no positive outcome. Meanwhile the bathroom sink decideds it too wants to be clogged. They diagnosed the kitchen sink with rusted out, leaky pipes and a fractured disposal and told us they'd back in the morning to fix the leaks and snake to bathroom sink, but we would have to wait for a new disposal to be ordered. Tuesday (today), noon rolls around. No longer morning I decide to call and see where they are cause by this point not being able to use the sink or dishwasher was causeing the kitchen to become rather disgusing. They come, they work, they fix the leaks...they get a call from the guy in the apartment across from me that his sink is leaking...Oops!!
As expected the disposal would be in on Wednesday and everything would be as good as new. I asked if I could run the dishwasher and was given approval from both the men. I loaded it up and went to brush my teeth in my nasty, freshly snaked bathroom sink only to return to the kitchen to see a waterfall spewing from underneath the sink. Water seeped halfway throughout my kitchen and nestled comfortably under my fridge. I called Matt's brother Mike to see if he could help me get my wet/dry vac out of their attic and pull my fridge out so I could clean it. Unfortunaltey no answer from Mike or Matt so I called maintenance once again. For the third time Tuesday they came to apt. 20 to assess the leaky sink and concluded it was spraying violently from the fracture in the disposal and in fact it wasn't safe to use the dishwasher. The man kindly pulled fridge from it's designated cubby in the wall so I could use my nice clean towels to soak up the water. Now perhaps it is evident to all why this french fry attempt was a complete disaster.
It has been quite a fiasco and I've ended up with a kitchen even dirtier than before (with the exception of the floor...it's really clean!), a dirty living room (had to move stuff from kitchen into there to prevent further water damage), a dirty bathroom (from the snaking), a dirty hallway (from everything under the bathroom sink having to be removed), and having to wash dishes by hand for the time being. Maintenence men are supposed to fix things however, they seem to leave a bigger mess than there was when the problem was in full swing. Needless to say I learned my lesson about potato peels...the disposal doesn't like them and may even be allergic.
Now lets talk about the complete failure of french fry mission 2. It wasn't so much that the fries were slightly over done that made this mission a complete failure...it was the events following preparation of the potatoes that we're still dealing with that gets the grade of big fat "F"! Here it goes...Sunday evening: "Mmmm...french fries," my pregnant taste buds made up their mind and there was no turning back. I peeled the potatoes over the sink rather than the trash this time thinking, we have a disposal, it'll enjoy some potato skins this evening. Not true. As I washed the skins down the growling drain I realized the water was tornadoing around in a very unnatural fashion. "What's wrong?" Matt asks. "Oh nothing...there is just a lot of water in there," I reply confidently hoping that everything would be O.K.. With the potatos cut into perfect french fry shape I began to fry. Well, I guess the oil may have been a bit too hot because like I previously mentioned, most of the fries were slightly overdone and that is the only thing I could attribute to the potato scented haze that filled our 1 bedroom apartment, not to mention the extreme burning sensation Matt and I were both experiencing in our eyes. So after eating disappointing batch two Matt checked out the sink that wasn't seeming to drain...hummmm?!?!
"Did I break it?" I queried.
"Not sure yet," he replied sounding a bit dismayed.
We had discovered a leak about a week before this whole incident but nothing too severe. So he takes apart the pipes to find nothing but potato clogging the way. If our sink was human the risk of heart attack was 100% with death as the only outcome. We knew this was a project beyond us and called in the maintenance men who came on Monday to routinely snake the drain...no positive outcome. Meanwhile the bathroom sink decideds it too wants to be clogged. They diagnosed the kitchen sink with rusted out, leaky pipes and a fractured disposal and told us they'd back in the morning to fix the leaks and snake to bathroom sink, but we would have to wait for a new disposal to be ordered. Tuesday (today), noon rolls around. No longer morning I decide to call and see where they are cause by this point not being able to use the sink or dishwasher was causeing the kitchen to become rather disgusing. They come, they work, they fix the leaks...they get a call from the guy in the apartment across from me that his sink is leaking...Oops!!
As expected the disposal would be in on Wednesday and everything would be as good as new. I asked if I could run the dishwasher and was given approval from both the men. I loaded it up and went to brush my teeth in my nasty, freshly snaked bathroom sink only to return to the kitchen to see a waterfall spewing from underneath the sink. Water seeped halfway throughout my kitchen and nestled comfortably under my fridge. I called Matt's brother Mike to see if he could help me get my wet/dry vac out of their attic and pull my fridge out so I could clean it. Unfortunaltey no answer from Mike or Matt so I called maintenance once again. For the third time Tuesday they came to apt. 20 to assess the leaky sink and concluded it was spraying violently from the fracture in the disposal and in fact it wasn't safe to use the dishwasher. The man kindly pulled fridge from it's designated cubby in the wall so I could use my nice clean towels to soak up the water. Now perhaps it is evident to all why this french fry attempt was a complete disaster.
It has been quite a fiasco and I've ended up with a kitchen even dirtier than before (with the exception of the floor...it's really clean!), a dirty living room (had to move stuff from kitchen into there to prevent further water damage), a dirty bathroom (from the snaking), a dirty hallway (from everything under the bathroom sink having to be removed), and having to wash dishes by hand for the time being. Maintenence men are supposed to fix things however, they seem to leave a bigger mess than there was when the problem was in full swing. Needless to say I learned my lesson about potato peels...the disposal doesn't like them and may even be allergic.
posted by Leiah @ 1:57 PM
1 Comments:
At March 14, 2006 6:08 PM,
Philip Deskins said…
I'm in the same boat you are Leiah! If you like Chinese food, I recommend trying those new Tyson frozen stir fry meals that come in a big bag. Rice, sauce, and everything else is included!
Post a Comment
<< Home