Friday, September 25, 2009

Johnny Appleseed and the Burnt Applesauce a/k/a Cooking Disaster #259

My first grader celebrated Johnny Appleseed's birthday today. They took a field trip to a theater where they saw a play about Johnny Appleseed. My son was one of a handful of kids chosen to go up on stage and participate.

This afternoon, I went to the classroom and helped with an apple "taste testing" party. Last night and this morning, I had peeled and sliced two pecks of apples (four little white bags of MacIntosh apples to be exact). It took forever even with my apple peeler. I washed, peeled, sliced and bagged five gallon-size Ziploc bags and carted them to school.

I was put in charge of the taste testing table. I washed and sliced six different apples for the 20 students to test and rate on a sheet of paper.

I was also put in charge of making applesauce in a wok sitting on a hot plate in the back of the classroom. I put one bag of the chopped apples in the wok, and they reduced down to applesauce. My fatal mistake was in not removing the first applesauce. I was in a hurry, so I simply added the next bag of chopped apples and went back to the taste testing table.

A few minutes later, I see the teacher run across the room as the smell of burning apples filled the air. I went over to the wok and started to stir the applesauce but the teacher informed me that the applesauce was scorched. However, it wasn't all that bad, and there was enough unscorched applesauce for each student to try. The teacher is going to take the other three bags home to make more applesauce there and bring it back for the kids. That way there wouldn't be any chance that I would f**k it up again.

I have set off smoke detectors with my cooking. I had to throw away pans when I tried to make homemade candy with a candy thermometer. I can't follow a recipe to save my life as witnessed by this old blog post.

My son saw what was going on, slapped his hand on his forehead and shook his head. All the kids had a good time even if the classroom smelled like burned apples.

I haven't been this embarrassed since last year when I lost a third grader at the Minnesota Children's Theater. I turned my back for a minute to get everyone lined up, and this little snot took off. I think I gave that teacher a heart attack.

Some mothers are like Martha Stewart. I am not. But one of these days a teacher is going to want to teach their class to knit, and then they'll come crawling back.

I'm going to my happy place to try and forget about this day.

2 comments:

  1. Ahhhhhhhhh the memories of being a class room mom come flooding back!

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  2. Love the story J! The part about Snuggy is too cute. You go girl!

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