Baked Shrimp with Tomatoes & Feta, or "Someday, We'll Look Back at that Time that I Dumped the Entire Pan of Baked Shrimp With Tomatoes & Feta onto the Floor, and We'll Laugh and Laugh. But not this day."
Yeah, that's right. Here is what happened to my beautiful, delicious shrimp with tomatoes & feta:
I took the skillet out of the oven by grabbing the handle with one hand (I had an oven mitt on). The skillet was too heavy, or too awkward, or too in the hands of an easily distracted clumsy moron, or something, but I clearly needed to have my other hand on the other side of the skillet and did not. It started wobbling, I couldn't steady it, and it dumped.
To add insult to injury, some of it landed on the corner of the oven door and slid down into the nether regions of my oven, where no sponge, dishtowel, toothbrush or baby bottle scrubber will reach. You know that dinner hasn't gone well when you find yourself standing over the oven door with your hubby saying "I think an Allen wrench will take that door panel right off."
I am not a happy camper.
Funny, when I first started making this, my biggest worry was that David wasn't going to get home from the Cub Scouts meeting with the camera in time for me to take pictures of this. Yeah, a couple of successful efforts with meringue and I get all cocky and assume there will actually be a dinner to photograph. Well, consider me permanently humbled. From here on out, you won't catch me taking one thing for granted in the kitchen.
The good news is that shrimp was on sale at Publix, so I only paid $3 something for half a pound of it. All told, I am only in this about $5 something in ingredients, plus whatever it is going to cost for the appliance repair man to come out and disassemble my oven so that I can clean the tomato and feta off of the inside part of the glass window.
As I was cleaning it up, I tasted some. To paraphrase George "It wasn't IN the garbage, it was ON the garbage" Costanza, the shrimp, tomatoes & feta that I tried were not ON the floor, they were on OTHER shrimp, tomatoes & feta that were on the floor. And it was all un-freaking-believably delicious. After I cleaned it up, David asked me in an upbeat tone what I wanted for dinner, and I barked "NOTHING!!" and stormed downstairs. Because I have an unfortunate tendency to get into "lash out at those I love the most" mode in the minutes immediately following a kitchen disaster. I am now memorializing the incident, i.e. writing this post, which I hope will help me cool down a bit. Then I will go make a couple of nice bowls of cereal for us for dinner.
My great bloggy buddy Pamela of Cookies With Boys chose this dish. I KNOW that it is fabulous because I ate some of it off the floor, and it blew me away, even in my irate state. It's Wednesday night, so I don't have time for a do-over before this needs to get posted. I am definitely going to try this again in the next few nights, and if it tastes anything like my floor sample, it is destined to assume a regular spot in our weeknight dinner rotation.
Great pick, Pamela! I'll make you proud on my next go-round, I just know it!
42 comments:
Oh do I feel your pain - a big pan of brisket met the same fate as your dinner - and the repairman had to come out to clean the glass inside the panels for me. Quite humiliating, I must say. For me, anyways.
I love the Seinfeld quote - the was the episode with the eclair, I believe!
I love the Seinfield reference! I definitely remember that one. I'm sorry you lost all your dinner. It sounds like a great combination!
Eek, I'm so sorry that you've had such a rough night. It's such a devastating feeling when you work to make some masterpiece and--bam--it's on the floor before you know it. I'm glad you ate some off the floor; I must tell you, because of my clumbsiness, I've gotten quite used to eating off the floor (I must have super immunity to dirt.)! Well, the recipe sounds delicious--and the art on the floor looks like it would be totally worth plopping down on the hardwood and eating the splattering with a fork!
Oh I totally feel your pain, I do I do, well if the floor was clean I would..... hehe just joking.
One day you will look back on your archives and laugh..
So sorry you lost your beautiful supper last night! Better luck next time and I hope you had a quick back-up plan!
That happens to all good cooks at least once (only once if you're lucky). Maybe you all should have pulled up cushions, claimed the floor was clean, and dove in - Janpanese style!
Oh no!!!! Cath, I'm so sorry! (I say you blame the Church--this never would have happened if we weren't told to abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday...)
If something can look that good strewn across a kitchen floor (and what a nice kitchen floor you have, by the way), you done good no matter what the fate of the dish, the oven door, or your nerves....
Oh no . . . I'm so sorry that your beautiful and delicious dinner ended up on the floor. I always think that the worst part of the experience is having to ponder it all while your cleaning it up. I think that because it's happened to me and it's happened to both of my parents. I suppose it happens to the best of us, doesn't it? At least you didn't have to hunt and peck for shards of glass, right?
Oh Cathy, I know how angry you were. We've all probably done it and why does it happen to dishes that we are so excited about and taste so damn good?
Even on the floor, I think it looks tasty!
Oh yes, I think there should be a new rule, that you can't be considered a good cook until you have lost at least one of your dinners to the floor!
I'm so sorry to see that that happened to your dinner, Cathy! I've dropped stuff before (and on one particularly memorable occasion had something explode), and it's incredibly frustrating. And I'm definitely a member of the "lash out at those I love the most" club when things aren't going right in the kitchen. =)
I hope today is better.
OH NO!!!!! I often take all of my cooking anger out on my boyfriend as well... I guess that is what they are there for, right? Food tasters and anger-taker-outer-ons (even though I always feel bad about the latter and skulk back and apologize).
Glad it still tasted good, though???
I am SO SORRY! This just sucks, what else can I say? I'm glad you got to sample a bit and that you liked what you tasted. Even though this was a crumby experience, it did look good, even on the floor!
Here's a little something for you, Cathy! :o)
Dear Cathy
I hope your toes didn't get burned
When the skillet slipped
And the pan over turned
Even with the shrimp splatted on the floor
And all of the juices inside the oven door
You always manage to find a way
To post a smile and make my day!
Thanks for participating with me! Keep smiling.
Oh no!! I am so sorry you had a tragedy in the kitchen!!! So sad!
Oh, Cathy. I'm sorry - I would have been mad as a hornet, too, and yeah, I have the nasty habit of lashing out at those I love the most. Charming, I am.
I hope that you get the chance to make this again, because it does look pretty good!
Aww, I am so sorry Cathy! I know how frustrating that is. My 6 year old always wants to help me with dinners and baking, then 9 times out of 10 will dump everything onto the floor. Ah well. I look forward to your post on how great it went next time. Don't you just hate that clean-up though?
Hope you and your family are doing well.
Oh no, it's never a dull moment for you! I hope next time it ends up on your plate and not the floor and you can fully enjoy how yummy this is.
Oh no cathy!!! I am so sorry to see the fabulous shrimp, tomatoes and feta in the nether-regions of the oven! This was a great dish and I hope you really enjoy it next time around! Those heavy skillets can be difficult. I have often grabbed a hot pan with a bare hand to keep from spilling the contents! Note to all those would-be attackers out there. Don't mess with us...we have a weapon and will beat you senseless with a 15lb copper pan!!! Ha ha!
OMG!! Seeing that food on the floor broke my heart...I totally felt your pain. I'm so sorry...
Glad you got a sample at least, I so would have done the same thing! ;)
Oh Cathy! That's awful! I'm dying to try it now but will remember to watch it out of the oven. :( I'm so sorry and hope the next one pans out better!
Cathy. . I'm so sorry. Another mishap for you in that kitchen! That happens to all of us sometimes. But maybe you can fix it again and next time eat a whole plateful!
I'm mailing you some PB pies pronto to heal your pain.
Oh no....it reminds me of my chocolate gingerbread cake that our beage wrestled off the counter. I laughed that you ate some from off the floor. I would have done the same. Too funny!
Oh no. I am so sorry. I did that once with a chocolate pie which was everywhere in the oven.
Thanks everyone! Glad to know that this happens to everyone on occasion.
Pamela, if you're not careful, I am going to get spoiled and expect a poem every time!
It has happened to all of us. Sigh.
I totally would have scooped it all up and served it off the floor.
Did I ever tell you about the time my cat was on the table licking the pate? I just flipped it over...
My sympathies! How totally frustrating! And you had the moral strength to blog about it! I salute you!!!! BTW, it looked delicious!!
Oh no! I feel for you! It takes me back to the time all of my cookies slid into the oven and into the cracks of the oven, and down the really small space between the oven and the cupboards. I was so furious and upset. Stuff like that is no fun at all! You'll have to try making this again sometime. And whenever I'm in a bind, cereal works great for dinner... and I always have a frozen pizza in the oven as backup.
That's the worst! I am so sorry this happened. At least the shrimp was on sale.
O no Cathy! At least the parts that didn't touch the floor tasted good. The other day, I had a little accident of my own and dropped my mixing bowl full of flour al over the floor.
oh my dear! I can't even tell you how many times I have dumped our entire dinner on the floor. I blame my mother for giving me her gift of being a klutz! I barked at my husband...but I know he felt pretty bad because he knows how hard I work to make dinner. :) I have tried this dish before, my neighbor made it a few weeks ago. It's a good one.
Ohh sooo sad!
That is the absolute worst thing that could happen. I can't believe it. So sorry. At least you got a little taste?
Mmm...is this the blog where they do all the comments in haiku?
Shrimp on other shrimp
and post of skillet falling...
won't happen twice now.
I don't EVEN like feta and I'm grieving a little...I think I'll have cereal for dinner too.
I hate it when that happens, and it does to all of us. I just don't know if I'm as dedicated a blogger as you are. I might have just bypassed tasting it and posted that it was the night we're all to eat cereal in solidarity!
Even after an hour of cooking and two of cleaning up, you are still one of the best reads out there. You're an inspiration!
We once had company over and were going to be serving a huge lasagna made unfortunately in a deep disposable aluminum pan. It twisted coming out of the oven and ended up on the floor, the oven door... It was a sizzling, cheesy disaster. Everyone was starving, and if it was just family we would probably have scraped into plates and wolfed it down, but there were the guests politely offering to help clean it up when you could tell they just wanted to leave and go home. We ended up ordering pizza (an hour wait) and making painful small talk that barely concealed the rumble coming from everyone's stomachs.
The recipe sounds delicious. I would have eaten it off the floor had it just been me!
ohhh no!! dinner on the floor :( so sad, especially when it sounds so good! i've done it myself, though. lots of time. roxie is always happy when it happens!
Oh what a shame! That has happened to me before. You are so funny taking a picture of it.
You poor thing! But I'm cracking up that you took a photo!! I'm sure we can all relate, I know I can!
I'm so sorry Cathy It happens sometimes (luckily not often) and is horrible !!A hug!
Cathy, this is the honest truth: my New Year's resolution was to take pans out of the oven with both hands! I have had so many problems and near disasters, not to mention bad elbows and wrists. It's a terrible habit and here, in March, I'm still having to remind myself every time I open the oven door. My worst disaster (that I haven't blocked out) is when I flipped an uncooked pumpkin pie on its way into the oven and it got in every single place that liquid pumpkin could get.
Cereal for dinner is a respectable choice, and should have a regular place in the menu, imo. Did you have any of that chocolate cake left to console yourself with?
Nancy
Oh no! I feel for you. What a disaster. I think I would have cried.
OMW...I am laughing so hard about you eating the shrimp off the floor but it was on the other stuff that was touching the floor...you are a hoot. I am starting to feel a whole lot better about that cake I turned out of the pan that fell all apart...yep, at least it wasn't on the floor! What would we all do without the giggles over here each week? And, justsoyouknow, it did look pretty good, even on the floor and oven!
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