Disaster is probably too strong a word, stupidity is more like it.
My husband took on the responsibility of making gluten-free bread years ago. I vaguely remember a hissy fit in my kitchen roughly six years ago where I was lamenting that our newly diagnosed celiac was pushing me into baking overload. I was trying to always have cupcakes and cookies on hand, along with bread for sandwiches….and there just wasn’t as much delicious ready made product available seven years ago.
I complained, loud and long, that every time I turned around, I was out of bread. He asked the fateful question “Is it difficult to make the bread?” And I’m sure that I unkindly said that anyone who knew how to read could bake a loaf of bread.
My husband baked his first loaf of bread, and then he just took it over. I haven’t baked a loaf of bread in---no exaggeration—years. It is my responsibility to buy the mixes and that’s it. It’s a beautiful thing.
So, last week he placed all the ingredients in the bread machine in their perfect order and set it in motion. I was blitzing through the kitchen doing a power clean and unplugging all the appliances because I read somewhere that this was a little “green” thing I could do to save energy.
I ACCIDENTALLY UNPLUGGED THE BREAD MACHINE!!!
Imagine his surprise when he popped open the top the next morning and there was a gooey mess instead of a finished loaf of bread! He left the half mixed dough for me to deal with, which I dumped.
I called him at the office to ask him what had happened to the bread machine last night. In a rather acerbic tone he responded that the machine doesn’t work so well when his wife unplugs it after he takes the time to get it all set up!
I was so embarrassed. What a dope. He started all over again after we had dinner that night and asked if I could just leave the bread machine plugged in and offset my carbon footprint somewhere else.
Kendall Egan
