Crazy Cooking Day!

I received a phone call from my friend Glen this morning who was too impatient to wait for the blog update of how the 'Dishwasher Lasagna' turned out as he was going to make it today. So once again here I go cooking where very few have cooked before.

I made up the Lasagna according to the instructions and it looked yummy!

I carefully triple wrapped it in foil and placed it in my dishwasher - and discovered a problem.

There was no way to fit the packet between the tines of the bottom rack. Careful examination of the pictures with the recipe printout led me to believe I could just rest the packet on the tines. Oh if only I had Internet at my apartment to do a more careful check! I proceeded anyway and when I opened the dishwasher to check how cooking was going, this was the sight that met my eyes.

The power of the jets had caused the packet to move against the tines and the tips had drilled a hole through the foil packet leaving me with a very clean soggy lasagna and this in my dishwasher!

That is a very tasty mix of freshly chopped Spinach and Ricotta Cheese clogging my dishwasher drainage area!!!

Undeterred I devised a plan - after all I was hungry and this was my scheduled lunch for the day! I drained the lasagna packet of excess fluid, put it in a Pyrex dish, added some fresh cheese and put it in the oven for 15 mins at 350C

Voila! Lunch was saved!

Careful examination of the Wiki how instructions show that the dishwasher used had collapsible tines so that the packet would fit on the bottom rack horizontally.



So my efforts in dishwasher cooking were foiled by my old fashioned dishwasher.
I've added a tip to the wiki how site suggesting that if your tines don't fold down like mine that you lay the packet in a dishwasher safe dish to prevent my disaster. Hopefully my friend Glen will do just that and let me know how it goes.

In other cooking news I made the Christmas Pudding. See this post for details and history of this most decadent dessert.

I carefully soaked all the fruits overnight in brandy - this is one boozy dessert.

Added all the other ingredients - eggs, flour, grated apple, spices etc.

And carefully wrapped it, and steamed it for 3 1/2 hours!

The aroma in the apartment was awesome! Now it will sit in the bottom of my refrigerator (even though it would survive fine in the pantry) until Christmas Day where it will be steamed for at least another 2 hours and then be consumed with Brandy Butter!!!

It was quite a cooking day - and I also did 6 hours of Defensive Driving, watched 2 movies ('Adaptation' and 'Singing in the Rain') and an episode of 'Lost'!!!