{"id":13753,"date":"2011-06-21T11:00:21","date_gmt":"2011-06-21T16:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/production.ou.org\/life\/other\/slice_of_life_mistakes_happen\/"},"modified":"2017-04-16T04:42:13","modified_gmt":"2017-04-16T09:42:13","slug":"slice_of_life_mistakes_happen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/food\/recipes\/slice_of_life_mistakes_happen\/","title":{"rendered":"Slice of Life: Mistakes Happen"},"content":{"rendered":"

Please note: Eileen Goltz is a freelance kosher food writer. The Orthodox Union makes no endorsements or representations regarding kashrut certification of various products\/vendors referred to in her articles, blog, or web site.
\n<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve all had moments in the kitchen when we\u2019ve screwed up. Not big screw ups like putting the oven on broil instead of bake or even forgetting to turn it on but rather those moments where the cake didn\u2019t rise because you forgot an ingredient or rose too much added one twice. Maybe it when you got halfway through the recipe and discovered what you were sure you had in the panty, you didn\u2019t. Those are the time when creativity can give way to discovery or disaster depending on what you do.<\/p>\n

Some of the inventions that happened by accident are the most appreciated ones.<\/p>\n

Good recipes and foods discovered by accident are typically infrequent events (except in my house where I never met a recipe I didn\u2019t try and change). Spectacularly delicious or disastrous anomalies most often happen when you\u2019re in a hurry and do something stupid, try and substitute one or two ingredients for ones you don\u2019t have. Examples of these kinds of \u201coops what the heck did I do\u201d can be found throughout all the grocery aisles:”<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at refrigerator rolls: In the early 1930s a baker of some renown, Lively Willoughby, was in a hurry one day and wrapped her unbaked biscuits in foil then stuffed them into cardboard tubes and then put them in the refrigerator to be made at a later time. When she finally got around to taking the dough out to bake the tube exploded. Referencing notes from the Encyclopedia of Consumer Brands it\u2019s said that her son had to scrape the dough off the ceiling with a knife.<\/p>\n

We pretty much all know the story of chocolate chip cookies. Toll House Inn’s Ruth Wakefield ran out of baking chocolate and she chopped up a bar of semi-sweet chocolate and added the pieces to her dough. The cookie put her Inn on the culinary map and got the attention of Nestle.<\/p>\n

Wheaties, the breakfast of champions was also a delicious boo boo. A worker at a Minnesota health clinic spilled some of the hot bran gruel onto a hot stove top. It cooked up into tasty flakey clumps. George Cormack a local miller heard about it and tinkered with the process. Fast forward to now and his company is now called General Mills.<\/p>\n

Popsicles are also another happy accident. On a cold and freezing day in the early 1900\u2019 Frank Epperson (an 11 year old) accidentally left his soda making paraphernalia on his porch. When he went to get it the next morning he discovered that the stick he’d been using to stir the flavoring into the water had frozen in the middle of the mixture. Deliciousness was born. He patented the process, changing the name from “Epsicle,” to \u201cPopsicle,” and we\u2019ve all enjoyed them ever since.<\/p>\n

The first sweetness without calories concoction kudos belong to chemist Constantine Fahlberg who, while working at John Hopkins in the late 1800\u2019s, spilled a chemical on his hands and forgot to wash them before sitting down to eat his lunch. He noticed the chemicals very sweet taste where he had touched the bread and then eaten it. After a little experimentation and a lot of tasting saccharin was born.<\/p>\n

Cooking mistakes like accidentally using Worcestershire sauce instead of vanilla (come on, the bottles are the same size and color, it happens) or forgetting to take the paper insert out of a pre-made pie crust before baking the filling (yes, it happened once) usually don\u2019t make it to the table. However, the following recipes are all happy accidents that should be repeated.<\/p>\n

Deep Dish Rhu-Ras-Blue Pie\u00a0(pareve)<\/u><\/strong><\/h3>\n

8 servings<\/p>\n

For when you don\u2019t have enough of any one fruit for a pie<\/em><\/p>\n

Ingredients<\/span>:<\/h4>\n