Bob's Angry Rants

I love to cook. I just find it very satisfying to bring a bunch of ingredients together into a tasty dish that combines their attributes.

Unfortunately, that isn't always how it works out. This weekend I found it deeply disappointing to turn 2 pounds of mushrooms into a steaming bowl of bland mush (trying to make cream of mushroom soup). Especially when it started out so promisingly.

In the early portions of the cooking (sweating the mushrooms and shallots) I had to order Anne (my wife) out of the kitchen on at least 3 separate occasions because it smelled so good.

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A quick side note. Anne and I cannot be in the kitchen at the same time when one of us is cooking. She comes from the "dash of this, pinch of that" school of improv cooking, whereas I am extremely anal about following a recipe to the letter (at least for the first few times I cook a dish). If I am not vigilant, Anne will just saunter into the kitchen and sniff pots, peek under lids, stick her spoon into things for a "little taste" and then offer unasked for advice. This is typically followed by me wagging my ladle about and sternly insisting that she get the hell out of my kitchen.

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So anyway, to make a long story short (too late), the whole thing went to crap shortly after I added the stock and water. The resulting soup was bland and a little grainy (probably wasn't blended enough).

I'm still on the fence as to whether I should eat my mistake as sort of negative reinforcement or if I should just throw it out.

On the plus side, my first try at a standard brown sauce turned out pretty well.