a few dinner fails

I'm always reluctant to report on recipe fails. Mostly because it's not fun to invest time, effort and money into something that didn't live up to our initial expectations. Then I have to ask myself, was it the recipe or was it something we did incorrectly?

Here are a few recipes which I don't recommend and will never try again.

First up is Welsh Rarebit. I've been wanting to try this for decades because of how it creeps up every once in a while in pop culture. I figured if we were going to give it a go, the recipe from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything would be our best guide. Guinness cheese sauce over toast really tasted lot hot vomit on toast. It was literally one bite and then tossed in the compost.

The second fail was this Beef and Mango Lettuce Wraps from Everyday Food Light. I was really excited about making this because our last lettuce wrap dinner was so amazing I wanted to make it again right away. Unfortunately this dinner fell so flat. Flank Steak is just too tough for a lettuce wrap and judging by how rare we eat our meat, being overcooked wasn't the reason for that. The dressing was just overly tart and almost bitter. And I can't imagine who would just eat cellophane noodles dressed in oil, scallions and s&p. Um, not me - it's horrible! The leftover flank steak was used the next day for Vietnamese Steak Sandwiches from Great Food Fast. Which after having these a second time around I have to state that they are beyond delicious, you must try them! Great way to use up leftover flank steak.

And the third terrible dinner we tried last week was Spicy Chicken Stir-fry with Peanuts from Everyday Food Light. Again, I expected this to be delicious and was looking forward to having snow peas since it's been ages since we had them last. Unfortunately just about every element of this dinner wasn't enjoyable. I ended up removing all the chicken from this and using it in another recipe which I'll blog about soon.

What was the thought process that went into compiling Everyday Food Light? I'm starting to notice that the first two Everyday Food books (especially the first) are fool-proof and delicious to boot. Let's hope this weeks meals keep us all a little happier.