I guess that would have to be the time I got mixed up and made a cake batter with powdered buttermilk, thinking it was flour. A tad messy in the oven . . .

........years ago I flavored cookies with a cough syrup insted of vanilla.

When I was a child, in grade school.
My mother used to make hot chocolate from a recipe in the Betty Crocker cookbook. It was called "Martha Washington's hot chocolate", and involved foaming egg whites, etc.
One evening, I asked to make it myself.
It was a disaster, eggs were flat, etc.
Instead of pouring it down the drain, I drank it all(I was taught never to waste)...embarrassed that I screwed up, then told my mother that I had decided not to make it.

I was sick as a dog all night, and i;m sure my mother figured what happened.

I decided to make Texas chili for DH, DS and his GF last year. I had never made it before because I usually stick to my tried and true chocolate chili recipe. But nooooo, I had to do it differently. The recipe basically consisted of beef chunks and gravy, not much else. I'm sure it was good (if you like that kind of chili), but none of us liked it. DH and DS kept commenting that they liked my "old chili". Not really a disaster, but to my family it was ;o)

I had one on Sunday! I was making a sour cream coffee cake. I wanted to make a small one for home and a large one for work, so I wanted to make it one and a half times the recipe. I did everything right, but the flour, which I doubled. I realized it when it was in the oven for about 20 minutes. It was as heavy as a brick when it came out. MIL loved it...but then, she will eat just about anything, except liver. LOL

Well, there was that time I served DD mashed potatoes and she kept complaining about them not tasting good. I thought maybe they needed more salt. She still complained. After awhile I was getting irritated with her so I took a bite, spit it out and started laughing. There was sugar, not salt in the shaker!!!

Linda

Probably it was the first meatloaf I ever made ... at least, it was the most memorable cooking disaster.

I was 17, newly married, and so excited to be cooking for my then-husband. My mom wasn't a cook at all, and we primarily ate at little cafe's or boxed/frozen dinners. Husband's mother was a terrific cook and he couldn't handle all the "fake food." So I looked up meatloaf in my brand-spanking-new Betty Crocker cookbook and later, would have sworn that I followed the directions exactly. But that thing was horrid. Even the starving stray cat that I would feed, wouldn't touch it.

The most FUN kitchen disaster was when current husband and I were living together and his boys were over for the weekend. I was making strawberry shortcakes and Ray (about 11 years old) came in and snuck up behind me, startling me. I had a can of whipping cream in my hand and in automatic reaction I sprayed him in the face. Thoroughly. He started yelling and was wiping the whipped cream off his face and flinging it at me. One of the other kids came in to see what was going on and slipped on the whipped cream and went down ... and a free-for-all began. We never did get our strawberry shortcakes, and the kitchen was a bear to clean ... but oh, did we have fun! LOL!

Because I had four older sisters, my mother had more help in the kitchen than she knew what to do with, so I never learned to cook.

Being a new bride meant I had to learn, quickly. I would go out every day and buy whatever I thought I could handle. I love breaded veal, and found a recipe in a magazine. Everything went well with the egg mixture, and up to the point where I read "dip in bread crumbs." I took several slices of bread and crumbled them up in a bowl, dipped the egg-coated veal in the bread and dropped it into the frying pan in the very hot grease.

I don't remember what we had for dinner that night, but it wasn't veal; probably Spam.

Sue

Last thanksgiving when I caught the toaster oven on fire..........stacy

Another new bride story. I wasn't much of a cook, but I saw a recipe in the newspaper for Duck with Orange Stuffing. Why that sounded good, I haven't a clue, but it did.

Got the duck, made the stuffing, put it in the roasting pan--all as directed. It smelled really good. I went to check on it and it was literally swimming in grease. The stuffing was soaked in it! I tried to save it but it turned out neither one of us (who hadn't eaten duck before) didn't even like it. And the stuffing was like orange bread soup.

Don't ask about the first time I made biscuits. You could have used it for a baseball and hit a homer without breaking that sucker!

Tried to make those peanut patty kind of candy things. It was humid that day. When we walked back into the house they had run down the counter and just HUNG, like stalactites!! Yep, reddish, pink stalactites with peanuts! LOL

first turkey I cooked after coming to America. :)

paper bag I cooked it in burst in to flames.

During DH's 40th birthday party and a house full of people, I put the shells of 24 hard boiled eggs in the disposal at the same time. My Dad had to take the plumbing apart to clear the clog.

first turkey I cooked after coming to America. :)

paper bag I cooked it in burst in to flames.

LOL.
My grandmother always roasted the Goose for Christmas in a supermarket paper bag, but the Thanksgiving Turkey in a roasting pan.
When I asked her why the difference, she said it was because the goose(and Duck, too) has so much fat under the skin, the paper absorbs it, while Turkeys are much, much leaner.

Not exactly a cooking disaster, but it's food related. I bought a banana cream pie for my husband's birthday, his favorite. I set it outdoors by the side door to keep it a secret. This was October and it was pretty cool. When I went to get the pie,it was covered with ants.

Sister was home from college with her roommate.
Decided to surprise them with breakfast, prepared by ME!
ME who had never cooked ANYTHING!

Frying bacon, grease caught on fire, ran to sink turned on the water, caught the curtains on fire, threw pan out in the back yard.

White kitchen was not white anymore!

My aunt made her first cherry pie, and used marshino (sp) cherries.
Leslie

Made a big pot of Penna. Dutch Chicken Corn Soup. Toward the end, I wanted to put a little more pepper in it. Not knowing that the top on the pepper shaker was lose I turned it upside down and with the first shake the lid came off and I dumped a whole bottle of pepper in it. We had wheaties for supper that night. Vique.

I had a double disaster recently. I was making a yeast bread and a non-yeast bread on the same day. Stuck yeast bread in the oven to rise for the second time and wrapped it in several dish towels. The oven wasn't on, just a draft free place for it to rise. Then I started making the non-yeast bread and turned on the oven to preheat. I kept smelling something burning and couldn't figure out what it was. Finally remembered the bread rising in the oven. The dishtowels were scorched but the bread was OK. Lucky I didn't have a fire! When the non-yeast bread looked like it was done, the inside of it wasn't. Had to throw that one out.

Everything I cook turns into a disaster, so there are too many to count.

However I do remember my brother Jim trying to make grilled cheese as a kid by dropping a slice of white bread and a slice of cheese into the same toaster slot! Needless to say, the cheese melted down into the crumb tray.

Once, I was making a pie and for no apparent reason the flourescent bulb over the sink exploded. Glass went everywhere and I had to throw the pie out. Another time, I was making stuffing, and I sliced the tip of my finger off cutting up the bread. I had to throw that out too.

When my Mom was a new bride, she made blueberry muffins using her new Mixmaster. Trouble is, she put the blueberries in the mixmaster when she made the dough, rather than gently stirring them in at the end. They came out completely blue!

>>I was making stuffing, and I sliced the tip of my finger off cutting up the bread. I had to throw that out too.The stuffing or your finger?

Can't BELIEVE it's been 23 minutes and no one else has hurled this zinger!