Chef Boyardee I Am Not

It happened one evening while the ex-wife was at work. As dinner time rolled around, the kids and I were faced with enduring starvation or my cooking; we should have chosen starvation. Now, I know better than to try and cook, but I feared I'd be thrown in jail for neglect if I allowed my children to go hungry. In retrospect, all I had to do, if brought before a judge, was to have him sample my culinary efforts. He would have awarded me a medal of honor--starving my children would have been more humane. In fact, when word leaked out that I was attempting to cook again, a swarm of flies pitched in to repair our screen door.

So, after long, poignant deliberation (three to four seconds), I decided to make goulash for dinner. Boil noodles, add sauce, and there you are; even I could do that.

I've always heard the best way to test the texture of noodles, when boiling them, is to toss one up to the ceiling. If it sticks, the noodles are done. I've never figured out, though, how to get those suckers down once they're up there. This situation is especially interesting if one has cathedral ceilings. Even more spectacular is if one has ceiling fans. Maybe around Christmas I'll dye some noodles red and green and toss them up to dangle from the fans hanging in my house.

You know, somewhere in my illustrious education one little speck of information escaped my attention: noodles love to surprise inexperienced cooks, like myself, and, when being boiled, bloat like a dead cow. I started out with a medium pot of slender, petite noodles and ended up with an enormous stainless steel mixing bowl of obese, monster-sized ones.

Now, I have this little quirk in my personality which drives me to always go one step further than needed when working on a project. Cooking is no exception. So, for a little bit of flavor I added some chili powder and red pepper to the goulash. Rifling through the fridge I found three or four jalapeno peppers. I thought, "Why not?" I chopped them up and tossed them in also.

A couple of bites and the next thing I knew, I was clawing through a mist which seemed to originate somewhere deep in my eye sockets. It was all I could do to stay conscious while grasping for any kind of cool liquid.

Oldest son--who was six at the time--fearing I had become possessed by some evil demon, grabbed his two brothers, dashed into the bathroom, and locked the door.

Meanwhile, I somehow found my way through the blur to the kitchen sink. Snatching a tall plastic cup, I felt for the taps and opened the one I hoped would give me cold water. I learned another great lesson that night--drinking water to douse an internal inferno, caused from eating jalapeno peppers, is akin to throwing water on a grease fire, it only makes things worse.

I should have take some hot dogs, held them in front of my mouth, and exhaled. At least then, my kids could have had a barbecue.

Well, with a frantic search, I finally found a jug of buttermilk on the top shelf of the fridge. After swallowing three huge sloppy gulps of the stuff, I coaxed my children out of the bathroom with the promise of cooking them popcorn on the stove. I even found what looked to be an excellent cooking oil for the job. I believe it was called...Karo Syrup.