My Cooking Fail

I really want to meet the person who decided that slow-cooker recipes are easy. Our conversation would go something like this:

Me: Oh hi!
Slow-Cooker Guy: Hello.
Me: Are you the one who said slow-cooker recipes are easy?
Slow-Cooker Guy: Yeah! You wanted to talk to me?
Me: Yes I did. I just thought I should mention that I HATE YOU!! *punches him in the face*

Let me assure you - just because a recipe is cooked in a crock pot does NOT mean that it is easy. Do not believe the lies that people like Slow-Cooker Guy tell you. They are just trying to sell slow-cookers.

I have a dilemma: my in-laws are coming over on Sunday, and I have to cook for them. Don't make the mistake of thinking these are any old people who might be impressed with Macaroni and Cheese, nacho chips, and a Coca-Cola (like I would). This family comes from a long line of FANTASTIC cooks. They won't admit it to you, but I think they might secretly be related to Martha Stewart AND Betty Crocker. Possibly even Aunt Jemima, even though she's black. If you met Jake and Michelle (Rex's siblings), you would believe that they have a black ancestor somewhere. But definitely one who can cook.

I digress. Back to my cooking dilemma. OBVIOUSLY I needed to come up with some great home made recipe that would be easy to cook and still pass as "Okay, I guess this girl really is taking care of my son/brother." I decided to go with Chicken Tortilla Soup. I found an "easy" slow-cooker recipe, and I figured that if I paired this dish with other Mexican accouterments (home made guacamole with chips, quesadillas, etc.) that I would have a pretty delicious meal on its way. I decided to trial run this recipe tonight so that I could see if it was as delicious as the recipe claimed.

WELL. I assembled my ingredients and began to cook. The recipe calls for "shredded chicken," but I happen to know that effectively shredding chicken is pretty difficult. I asked Rex if cubed chicken would be okay, but he said, "Well, it would be okay, but shredded would really taste a lot better..." So obviously I had to shred it. The thing about shredding chicken is that you have to cook the chicken all the way through first, and then you shred it. I took the chicken breasts out of the freezer and put them in the microwave to defrost. These chicken breasts were HUGE!! I don't know if the chicken was on steroids or just well endowed, but our dinner definitely included either the A-Rod or the Dolly Parton of the chicken world.

When the chicken FINALLY defrosted (after three rounds of hitting the "defrost" button and trying to get them to thaw), I put them in the pan I had prepared. I discovered that cooking chicken this way is not very effective when the chicken breasts are as thick as a dictionary. The outside of the chicken CHARRED, and I kept flipping it over and flipping it over, but I couldn't get the middle to cook. I cut the breasts in half and kept trying, but the middle stayed a pleasant shade of bubble-gum pink. By the time the outsides were completely charred, our entire apartment was filled with smoke. YES I had the stovetop fan on, but it couldn't eat up the billowing burned-y steam fast enough. Rex had to open the door to our apartment and turn on our huge window fan in the doorway to try to aim the smoke in the hall (great - so all our neighbors could discover what a fabulous cook I am).

Finally I gave up on the chicken. I left it in the pan (I mean, it couldn't really get worse), and I decided to try preparing the other parts of the soup. I could attempt to cook new chicken once I had the rest of it done. I got out the canned goods I needed and went to find the can opener, but Rex informed me that it was in the dishwasher. So I couldn't put the canned ingredients in, but no problem. I decided I would just put in the spices first! I got out the spices and went to measure them, but I had no measuring spoons. Rex informed me that these too were in the dishwasher. Awesome. I said, "Great Rex. I have been working on this soup for forty-five minutes, I have put in all of the ingredients I can, and our 'soup' is comprised of only TWO CUPS OF WATER!"

Not a good start to my cooking experiment. I was beginning to wonder how much Rex's mom would frown at me if I just got some Hot N Ready's. I suddenly remembered another part to my soup - vegetables! I could begin cutting up the vegetables! I quickly retrieved my slap chop and prepared to chop vegetables. I looked at my recipe, and it called for "one medium sized onion." What the dickens does "medium" mean? That is so vague! I looked in my refrigerator and found that I had two onions. Dang. I was hoping I would have three, and then I could line them up in size order and just pick the middle one. No luck. I was stuck with two onions. I could only have larger and smaller. No medium. I chose the larger one (because after all, who doesn't like onions?) and I set to chopping.

Once I finished chopping my "medium" onion, I began to mince my garlic. Now, I have an issue with this. A confession, really. I am almost 22 years old, and I have NO idea what "mince" means. To the best of my knowledge, "mince" is a fancy word for "chop up really small." I feel like it probably has a more precise meaning, but please don't ask me what that is. As I chopped my garlic into microscopic pieces, I suddenly felt tears running down my cheeks. I was not crying because of my frustration with the garlic, the unopenable cans, or even my chicken ashes. I wasn't even crying at all, but rather my eyes were watering uncontrollably from the freshly chopped pile of medium onion that was sitting next to me. I guess the oils didn't hit my eyes until I started on the garlic, but then they certainly hit me in full force! Have you ever tried to "mince" something when your eyes are watering so badly that you can't even see what you're cutting? I have. I'm lucky I didn't chop a finger off.

FINALLY, after the dishwasher was finished and my burned chicken was salvaged to the best of my ability, I threw all of my ingredients into the crock pot. Then I suddenly realized that I had been using the recipe I was going to use for Rex's family, which has about fifteen servings (you should meet his brothers - they eat a lot). Yep, I had fifteen servings of Charred Soup for only Rex and me.

I let it simmer for the hours required, and I skeptically took off the lid to get a whiff. Surprisingly, it did not smell horrible. Rex and I decided to try some (what did we have to lose?) and even more surprisingly, it tasted pretty good! We even had seconds! Even with us having seconds, though, there are still eleven servings left in the crock pot. Ha ha. Anyway, I decided that we are going to go with this recipe on Sunday after all. Hopefully I learned enough from this experience that we can make it work for Rex's family. They had better brace themselves for this. But hey, if it goes horribly wrong, there are always Hot and Ready's. I may not be in the bloodline of Betty Crocker, but I think I might be distantly related to the Little Caesars guy.