Colossal food failures

So, after last night's stuffing failure, I feel obliged to write a brief account of the other food failures I have made my family and new friends endure since moving to Rome. Wednesday before Christmas, I find a turkey at the supermarket....after we had given up on the turkey for Christmas. While I am somewhat ashamed to admit I didn't have the energy or time to go to a butcher and order a proper turkey, I was very excited to find the Perfect Christmas Dinner Turkey (ok...so, it was only 2.6 kilos, but it was a turkey!). After the excitement subsides, and I realize the bird has mysteriously ended up in our cart....and my pragmatic side thinks through what we need to make a full turkey dinner. Stuffing, cranberry sauce....hmm...definitely challenging. I buy a quarter loaf of day old bread, celery, onion and chicken stock with the hopes of figuring out the stuffing, and know that cranberry sauce is too much to hope for. It is not until I get home that I read the "best before Dec. 24th" sticker prominently displayed on the front that I again have a sinking moment of realization....this will not be the Christmas meal! Christmas eve it was then....

Stuffing starts off well...how hard could this be, right? Its just stale bread that is moistened and then cooked, right? Ha, ha, ha....cutting the bread into squares, mixing them with fresh herbs, spices and olive oil went fine. After I put them in the oven for a "toasting" things started to go down hill fast. The kids needed something (times 2), the dogs needed something, and Richard was telling me about his next ultra adventure....and then, all of a sudden I smelt something burning! Black charcoal bricks met me in the oven.....after sifting through the coals, a few squares seemed edible, so I cut up the onions, celery and apples to add. I remembered the old adage "everything is better with butter" and added extra butter to the liquid, and through the concoction into the oven. Wow.....I didn't really know that stuffing could be so bad. The result, squishy charcoal with buttery/greasy liquid. YUM!

Before this adventure into the "kitchen nightmares", we had guests over for Thanksgiving. Both the husband and wife are trained chefs, and while he has moved into hotel management and she is a professional mom, they both still have a refined palette for good food. Luckily, Richard was in charge of the Butterball turkey, and Stovetop was my new friend, and I had found "the one market in all of Rome" that sold cranberries and cranberry-orange sauce was so easy, I even did a decent job. We had watched Alton Browne make a cranberry-pear pie, that he claimed was easy and delicious. Famous last words. I read the recipe, watched the show and thought....I can do this with a couple of substitutes....like don't make my own pastry (use the store bought!) and use regular flour instead of tapioca flour. No problem....well, it wasn't edible...more like glue in a pot with "extra" lumps...the crust was particularly poor, as the outside was burnt to a charcoal crisp, and the insides were limp and wet-noodly, with the unnatural gleam of poorly cooked pastery! And, the worst part.....knowing it was bad as my husband served it to our friends....they tried...oh did they try to eat it with a smile! But, it was AWFUL! A legendary horror that has now become a kitchen nightmare of my own:)