Yesterday, I was saved by a cow.
I am not exaggerating.
I decided to cook Chicken Chili from a free video recipe that was sent to me in an email from American’s Test Kitchen. According to their website, America’s Test Kitchen is Public Broadcasting’s most watched cooking show, and silly me, who really doesn’t like regular beef chili all that well, said, “Let’s make THAT.”
They want you to be a subscriber for a fee and regularly send recipes to entice you to reach for that credit card and break out of the “free” world.
I have to admit, I was tempted to sign up… until yesterday.
I watched their video on how to make Chicken Chili. It involved three different kind of green chillies: jalepeno, pablano, anaheim. The woman was chopping the poblano and anaheim chillies in what she called a crude chop and then added them into a food processor. She added two jalapeno chillies that she had minced apparently by hand “off” camera into the mix without any explanation of why she didn’t cut them along with the other chillies.
I now know why.
She was probably chopping them with latex gloves on both her hands as that apparently is the only sure fire way to avoid having your hands go on fire from coming in contact with the jalapeno juices.
I noticed the redness right after putting them into the food processor. I tried cold water and that seemed to make it worse. One hand literally was burning while only part of the other. It was red and inflamed and at first I thought it would simply go away. I continued to make the recipe and remembered something about the jalapeno being tricky but, honestly, not having cooked all that much, I didn’t bring a lot of “chili” awareness to this video.
America’s Test Kitchen, on the other hand, is a cooking show. These people know their chillies, one presumes. She didn’t warn the viewer, nor did the host, Christopher Kimball, a bespectacled professorial man who has written many cooking books and is a magazine editor and publisher of Cook’s Illustrated and Cook’s Country magazines. He is generally quite genial and if cooking steak, for example, lets you know what part of the cow is being eaten, complete with a graphic.
I had to Google to find what part of the cow was the antidote to America’s Test Kitchen and the jalapeno juice: milk. I had to soak my hands in milk, several times in the course of two hours, before they returned to normal. The antidote came from a woman who had suffered with her hands for over 12 hours until she had finally came across the antidote that worked. It was also clear that if had I gotten it in my eye, I’d have been in an additional world of hurt beyond the powers of milk.
So, my hands were saved by a cow yesterday and they also were saved from reaching into my purse to get my credit card for Public Broadcasting’s most watched cooking show as well.
Maybe if you are paid subscriber they’ll tell you what foods can make your hands spontaneously burst into flames and your eyeballs fall out just in time for Halloween?
©Pat Coakley 2009
PHOTOGRAPHY CANNOT BE USED WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION
That’s what you get for messing with a country that thought Pinochet was a stand up guy.
All joking aside, I’m amazed that you didn’t know that chillies will burn delicate skin and be thankful you’re not a Moslem, if you catch my drift. I say amazed because it was in the US that I learnt so much about chillies; I just thought all you guys knew all about them.
The silver lining in this cloud is that you can be glad that there are still new things you can learn at your stage in life.
Is it all chillies, Razz? Or, just the jalapeno? This shows you how abysmal is my chili wisdom. I’ve actually rarely had any interaction with a chili in my life, believe it or not!
I think razzbuffnik has done a fine job of summing up the chili issue. However, he did not mention the picture of one of our odder holidays — Halloween. These people are really in the spirit of the thing, you might say. I wonder if they have children, or if it’s just a couple of empty nesters who never got over it.
Good point, Don. My guess is they have children as I saw some three wheel bikes out back!
Oh My! Did you dare to eat the chili?
Sue Anne, You are right, I did pause and consider throwing the whole thing out. However, I remembered I’d eaten things elsewhere with chillies in it and didn’t have to call 911. Plus, when I went on line to find an antidote, it was clear this was an issue and they all lived to tell about it. So, yes, I tasted it. It was flavorful but not worth the aggravation. This shall be the one and only time I’ll make chicken chili
yeah…so how was it? good? sorry that happened to you howz ur hands?
Hey, Renee…it was good but as I said to Sue Anne, not good enough that I’ll make it again. My hands are back to normal and I have learned by chili lesson the hard way!
Never watched America’s Test Kitchen so I watched the video you described in perfect detail. How did you discover the milk remedy?
And if you thought the chicken was good, I want to try it! Don’t know anything about Chile’s myself, except I have eaten Jalapeno jelly and love it!
However do you find these things and then fashion them in to a blob? You are an amazing girl!
Cousin, you too would have blob material if you take a match and set your hands on fire!
Pat, one of the hazards of being a cook is things like this unfortunately. The idiots on tv often don’t tell you these lovely things. Some ingredients stain, others burn.. they smile for the camera and make it look wonderful.
Although I am what most people would call a “cook” I don’t watch those shows for that reason. They bug me. They leave out how difficult it is to get to some of the ingredients like cleaning them and preparing them.
Im sorry about your poor hands. If you ever eat something spicy, drink something sweet to counteract it. That does the trick.
Poor you. :(
Holy moly. If it was a ” Test Kitchen ” why on earth didn’t they tell you that you needed to study!
The intensity of some chilis is enough to cause serious damage to soft tissue- like eyes, which thankfully you had the sense not to touch.
Wasn’t it irresponsible for them not to warn or show what they were doing?
How could we have you with both hands AND eyes that are compromised!
I’ve learned more about chilis from living here than I ever even considered needing to know.
Does this same family festoon with equal ferocity for Christmas too? That’s quite a shot.