Hot and Cold

Who knew the you can't pour hot melted butter into cold milk?  If the half-encouraging, half-wise ass text messages flying back and forth between Melissa and Brutus Buckeye are any indication, the answer is "everyone by Joe."

Yes, my Cinnamon Waffles with Caramelized Apples and Caramel Whipped Cream took a disastrous turn when I poured the butter I just melted in the microwave into the cold buttermilk.  Within two seconds of mixing I noticed what appeared to be ice crystals forming on the whisk.  When I ask Melissa what was going on, she knew right away that either the milk curdled or the butter separated.  And since that was the last of the buttermilk we had on hand, it was also the end of my homemade waffle batter recipe.

I turned to the Bisquick we had on hand from the pancake attempt a few weeks ago.  The apples and whipped cream turned out pretty darn good, and once the waffles cooked we certainly enjoyed the meal.  We can't score the waffle aspect of the recipe since we never got to try them, but the apple topping and the whipped cream each get four stars.

My sidedish was just plain disappointing.  I found an Apple and Maple Sausage recipe that I thought would go great with the waffles.  There may be been several points where I went wrong with this one:

• I used chicken instead of pork sausage (pork never leads you astray)
• I decided to add cherries
• I prepared the patties the night before
• I chopped the apples more finely than was probably intended

But no matter where it took the turn, the end result was awful.  I tried one out of the pan and decided not to even plate it.  I just threw out the entire batch.  Since I changed so much about the recipe, I can't really score it, but my version of the recipe gets zero stars.

I've made the decision that next week needs to be scaled back a little bit.  It has to be something that I have a proven ability to deliver, and I think I known just the thing.