One Thing After Another

Yesterday I hosted the second Seder.  There were several mishaps along the way, but the meal turned out.  During the course of the Seder, the story of the Israelites exodus from Egypt is retold, including the ten plagues.  Last night, we experienced a few.  Heavy hail poured from the sky just as we were about to start the Seder, and our lights flickered (=darkness) for a moment.  There was a little bit of blood, and as my sister said in jest, wild beasts (= kids running around).  Thankfully, it stopped there.  Here are some other things that happened during the course of the day.

The main course was a 16.88 lb. turkey.  I've made turkey before, although not my favorite thing to make.  However, I think it was the first time without any one here to assist.  It was a beast to get into the pan.  I planned to use a bag to cook it in since that keeps it moist.  After tough maneuvering, I finally got it into the bag, only to have the bag break.  So out came another bag, and I finally got it in.  Next was getting the beast into the oven.  I realized I needed to take an upper rack out, and thought I might be able to raise a rack.  When I tested that, the bag touched the upper heating element on my oven, melting plastic to a little bit of the turkey.  That meant removing the bag, cutting away some of the turkey, and just tenting the turkey with foil rather than a bag.  Oh, and scraping away some melted plastic from the element and smelling burnt plastic for about an hour.  Yum!

Before starting on the turkey, I made potato kugel, since I knew the cooking temperature for the turkey wouldn't be hot enough to do both at the same time.  Of course, the kugel stuck to the pan.  Sadly, a little was lost along the way.  Rather, 2/3 of what I made stuck, but somehow everyone had kugel.  On top of the cooking issues, we sprung a leak under our kitchen sink.  We are still under warranty for our home, so called the builder.  Now just waiting for a plumber.

The most entertaining mini-disaster last night was getting a bottle of wine open.  My husband is an expert bottle opener, but he wasn't home from work just yet.  So I asked one of my guests to open the bottle.  This is where the blood comes in- she cut herself on the opener, but not too badly.  Just a few drops.  However, that wasn't the problem.  She got the curly-cue of the screw into the cork, when the corkscrew broke.  No- not the cork.  The metal screw sheared off leaving about a centimeter of metal sticking up.  We spent the next 20 minutes trying to pry it out with pliers, and then eventually got it with another corkscrew.  Four adults around the island taking turns was amusing.

The rest of the evening wasn't particularly eventful.  I did spill a boiling hot bowl of soup right behind my nephew, but thankfully neither of us got burned.  In the end, we all ate, dinner actually turned out well, and we got to enjoy each other's company.  And no major injuries, illness or damage occurred.  Now I can enjoy not having to do anything... well, other than entertaining the Babe and finish cleaning up my kitchen.