Dinner Disasters

We trade Sunday dinner back and forth with my mom. We get a nice dinner each week, and only have to cook and clean up half the time. It is a great system, and we look forward to our dinners. Unfortunately, I have bad luck lately. I know how to cook, and I can pull off a decent mean, thank you very much. I did Thanksgiving and Christmas all by myself (mostly) and they were great. Apparently, I used up all my allotted "good dinner" stars on those meals.

Dinner for Jerry's birthday was, well, a disaster. Besides him being sick, nothing came out right. The biscuits were over cooked, the grits were dry and gritty, the hash brown burned to the bottom of the pan, and I forgot to cook the bacon. Tyler rescued us with scrambled eggs. Jerry was too sick for cake, so that sat out for several days. By the time we got to it, it was dry and not what a red velvet cake should be. Even the frosting messed up, and I decorate cakes for cryin' out loud.

This past week, disaster knocked on the door again. Aunt Susan Jane was coming to join in the fun and I was looking forward to a nice dinner. I planned turkey breast, stuffing, gravy, corn, and brownies for dessert. The turkey didn't thaw, so I called to push dinner back a little while. The stuffing was fine, or so I heard. The gravy was too salty (packaged gravy that came with the turkey, so that one isn't my fault). The corn was fine. The turkey cooked 1/3 of the way, in 2 hours, mind you. Turkey went back in the oven and Tyler saved us with pancakes. Pancakes, stuffing, gravy, and corn. What a Sunday dinner. Oh yeah, and since the turkey went back in the oven, the brownies didn't happen. When we were eating leftovers the other night, part of the turkey STILL wasn't cooked all the way, after 3 hours of cooking.

It seems my kitchen is cursed. Let's cross our fingers that the birthday cake for this weekend turns out right.