Nostalgia and Domestic Catastrophes

There's a story behind these glasses, some of which will remain within a small circle, lest a ghost from the past arises and comes back to haunt the original storytellers.

For today, I'll tell you that on Sunday they contained a delightful concoction.

I called the concoction, whipped up in a hurry in my kitchen, a Lovestead purple cow.

Yes, the bossies on the glass are, indeed, purple, as were the contents.

I had just learned that my two nieces were coming, so I scurried about, mixing up the delightful treat and finding an image from the Internet to print off and tape to the glasses.

When they walked in the door, Laura and Maureen were each presented a glass and told to "finish it this time."

With help from the hungry mouths that accompanied them, they eventually handed back the empty glasses.

Their assessment of the Lovestead purple cow: it was delicious----much better than the one that fate allowed them to bypass many years ago.

Purple cows take me back, just like the Good and Plenties the customer in front of me purchased at Co-Op yesterday.

I stood there smiling as he and the clerk discussed their candy of choice.

Finally, I could stand it no longer.

"I wrote about Good and Plenties in one of my books," I suddenly announced to the stranger and to the clerk.

"Good and Plenties Won't Get You Love, but a Harmonica Will," I went on to explain.

The stranger did not seem too impressed when I explained to him that Good and Plenties did not get me the "rich man" for a husband in the seventh grade, but at the age of 26,  a harmonica quickly endeared me to my husband of almost 37 years.

The customer left with his Good and Plenties without comment, but the clerk liked my story.

I decided I liked the clerk cuz she has a mind that works like mine---she sees tangible things,  and they immediately take her on a journey to a nostalgic moment in her life.

Good lady, I thought while walking from the store. 

Purple cows take me clear back to about 1957-58 during my first year of 4-H cooking.  They were in the project book, as were wienie boats, sugar cookies and vanilla pudding.

I actually don't have any vivid memories of the purple-cow assignment, except for its great name, but I've heard purple cow stories from other sources, and they have stuck. 

With the wienie-boat requirement, I learned a quick meal to fix in a pinch.  In fact, I still like a dinner of wienie boats to this day.

Slice a hotdog or sausage down the middle.  Insert a couple of strips of cheese.  Decorate the top with catsup, and bake in the oven until the cheese is melting down the sides.

With homemade vanilla pudding, I learned what happens to pudding when you just simmer the ingredients rather than bringing them to a full boil.

The family did not get to excited about those bowls of milk with yellow lumps floating around the surface.  

While completing my first batch of sugar cookies, I learned basics of baking, like greasing the pan before putting in batter or dough.

So, I've known for almost 54 years to grease the pan.

Well, Sunday, in addition to whipping up those purple cows in a pinch, I threw some Betty Crocker brownie mix into the bowl, added white chocolate and butterscotch chips and mixed it all up.

With bottle of oil right next to my baking pan, I must have been too hasty.  I forgot to grease the pan.

Didn't realize that until after I took the partially baked brownies from the oven.  

Didn't realize the brownies were partially baked until I started cutting those squares.  Some of the middle squares disintegrated into a lava-like flow.

Still, little fingers found a way to enjoy the chocolate goo. 

When company had left and purple-cow glasses and brownie pan remained behind, waiting to be washed, I noticed stuff stuck to the bottom of the brownie pyrex baking pan.

Oops, didn't grease the pan, I thought. So, I filled it with water and left it for a few hours to soak.

Even later, I could not pry that dough,  which seemed to be cemented to the bottom of the pan.

That's when I remembered an old domestic trick taught to me by some wise cook years ago.  

Put a little cleanser or dish-washing soap in the pan and warm it up on a burner.  The stuck stuff will come right off.

And, over the years it has.  

What the wise cook failed to mention, however,  was that this trick may not work with pyrex pans.

Since I failed to ask, I did not foresee a problem with my brownie pan being warmed up on the burner.

I stood over the baking dish, slowly breaking away the cemented dough from the bottom.  

Had it almost clean when:

POOFFFFFFFF!

Now, at almost 64 years of age and still alive to tell about it,  I know what shrapnel looks like, chocolate shrapnel, no less.  

The explosion sent shrapnel clear to the dining-room table in another room off the kitchen.

It also sent, LUCKILY, just one piece into my hand.  

I've never seen such a mess.

I just let my hand bleed for a while as I strategized the best way to clean up a million pieces of chocolate-coated shrapnel from the counter tops, the sink, the carpet, the island--virtually everywhere within a 20-foot circle. 

Finally, I washed the blood from my hand and went to work.  

Forty-five minutes later, after discovering the final, final most challenging mess deep down within the burner where all the water and a lot of chocolate went when the dish exploded-----I said a little prayer of thanks.

It coulda been a whole lot worse.  I'm still thinking of how fortunate I was not to have that shrapnel kill me right there on the spot----or at least leave me pretty maimed.

It would not have been a pretty sight for Bill to come in and find his wife with all that chocolate, all that blood and all that broken glass.

My day with the pyrex-dish explosion ranks right up there with a few years ago when I canned all that lovely uncooked salsa and found it ready to explode both in my kitchen and my mother's a couple of days later. 

There's humor in the story.  There's nostalgia, but best of all, there's a lesson:  you can still remove that cemented stuff from the bottom of your cooking pans with the soap and burner treatment----as long as they're not pyrex!

And, if you want a really good purple cow---Lovestead variety, get some vanilla ice cream, a bag of huckleberries, a little milk and sugar (to your desired taste).   

Mix it up with a blender and enjoy. 

And, if you do it right, nothing will be left to stick to the bottom!