I have a confession.

Has quarantine stockpiling cramped with your style yet? Almost tripped yet? Don’t know where to put all those extra packs of paper products, cans of chickpeas or pasta (or for those who snagged a huge bag of flour, all those kilos of flour)? Sigh…

I remember reading the food blog of a famous cookbook author and she had a special section called Disasters, which is very understandable for anyone working in a tiny kitchen space with multiple projects and well..experimenting in order to create recipes.

But this disaster didn’t come from experimenting with baking or cooking per se, so much as a cramped space to work with.

Don’t get me wrong, normally I like cooking to be a relaxing thing, nothing like Hell’s Kitchen. But this story is one that fits more with a Disaster kitchen. Oh Gosh, I can already picture Gordon Ramsay screaming (but to be fair even Gordon himself has caused a restaurant kitchen fire, likely while trying to get his bacon crispy directly over the burner..so I will give myself some grace here).

When I look back, it came from being over-ambitious and trying to multi-task in a uni-tasking kitchen without enough counterspace for multiple projects, let alone a food photoshoot that dirties up more dishes and clutters up more space that you don’t currently have. And the stockpiling chaos and stress of 2020 did not help.

The recipe for disaster: A dash of clumsy, a squeeze of well-meaning food photo shoot, a good pinch of disorganized, stressed and sleepless, plus a good overseasoning of the spice blend that is 2020, and my friends, I present to you- the perfect set up.

And if you do have a bigger kitchen, but you have kids, well I don’t need to tell ya. The pain of stepping on a Lego block or locking yourself in the washroom for a few minutes to hide from the little ones has probably gotten to you by now too. Screen time- what screen time? And we all thought the quarantine would make us better organized with our spring cleaning, and turn us into better cooks, better parents and partners, and fitter people, educated by Harvard’s free courses, etc., right?

“Life is what happens, when you’re busy making other plans” -John Lennon.

Of course my first instinct was to clean, but now I think perhaps I should have taken photos because it literally looked like a crime scene of a murder… And I looked like Carrie, drenched in red streaks, head down to my bare toes.

I think it simply started with me making Sangria sorbet while roasting some veg and frying some meat and my elbow knocking over a wine glass. Frantically I started cleaning the broken glass and somehow whilst doing that I knocked over the container of sorbet, but I didn’t realize this as I was still vacuuming the glass on the ground.

It all happened so fast that I didn’t see how it all happened.

Next I look up, and I see red.

At first I just stared bewildered at how it happened. I can just picture Gordon Ramsay yelling, “Why are you just standing there like a toilet brush?!” Lol.

In what seemed to defy all laws of physics, the sorbet didn’t just explode in the tiny kitchen, it projectile exploded on white furniture outside my kitchen. It even reached the top of my tall book shelf to where my radio was. I had no idea sorbet was this potent.

It literally looked like red blood all over my furniture and floor. And apparently, by the look of my dress (which was just an afterthought at this point) well it turns out I was 100% the culprit. Honestly it felt like I knocked over one domino, and as I frantically tried to fix it, the rest kept coming down even more. (Dear Lord forgive me for swear words I used your name in…)

Here is a funny video of how I feel today and how I sometimes feel about 2020 in general so far

So I guess the moral for me is, clear as much counter space as you can before cooking and don’t get overambitious all at once in the world’s narrowest kitchen. And maybe to slow down a bit with the food photoshoots. But obviously nothing can be done about the stockpiling piles that they advised us to get. They have been a whoot in a small space, no?

Oh and when everything goes wrong, forget using the rest of the wine in a recipe, and pour it generously into a glass.

when life spills your lemonade, turn it into a funny story 😛

How about you? how is your organization or chaos with stockpiling, home schooling, baking and cooking, etc? any disasters or funny stories yet?