We recently asked the BuzzFeed Community to tell us the worst thing that's ever happened to them while cooking. Here are their frightening stories.
1. "My hand melted onto the handle."
I was in my first year of culinary school and was in charge of cooking some very expensive beef. I put the pan in the oven to finish off, and then when it was time to take the pan out, I was in such a rush that I forgot to use a cloth to protect my hand. Not wanting to drop the beef on the floor, I held the pan until I could get to a counter. My hand ended up melting onto the handle. It took two people to pry it off. The smell was almost worse than the pain.
2. "I burned my titty on the oven rack."
I was trying to get ready and cook supper at the same time, but I didn't have a bra or shirt on yet. As I bent over to pull a roasted chicken out of the oven, I burned my titty on the oven rack. It took two months to heal, but I still have the scar. The chicken was good though.
3. "The knife sliced my butt in two."
My husband and I had just gotten home from the grocery store, and he had placed the bags all over the countertop and was outside doing something. I was putting them away and had forgotten that my freshly sharpened chef knife was still lying on the counter under one of the bags. I picked up the bag and was turning away when the bag caught the edge of the knife and knocked it off the counter. It dropped straight down and made a eight inch long, two inch deep clean slice down my butt. It was hard to explain to the ER doctors that I had stabbed myself in the butt.
—Taiga Hilliard, Facebook
4. "My hair got stuck in the mixer, lifting my scalp off my head."
I was making mashed potatoes for the first time, and I wanted to make sure it was really creamy to make my mom proud. I leaned in very close to get at good look and my long hair got stuck in the electric mixer! I just stood there screaming. Thankfully my dad was right next to me and pulled the plug out before any serious damage had been done. However, my scalp had lifted off my head, and I ended up with one giant bruise covering my whole scalp. Word to the wise: Wear a hair band.
—Anna Hasberg, Facebook
5. "I set my groins on fire with habanero powder."
I was making a bowl of chili, which was nearly done cooking. I tasted it and found it to be a little bland, so I added a pinch of habanero powder. This one little pinch took a large bowl of chili from bland to very spicy. Ignoring the warning to wash your hands thoroughly after touching the very spicy powder, I went to use the bathroom as soon as the chili was done cooking. It took very little time for me to realize the error of my ways. I will spare you the exact details, but the next half hour was spent in agonizing pain standing in the shower holding a glass filled with ice water.
6. "Oil exploded all over my boobs."
Once while I was staying with a friend, I was making some fried quinoa patties for the first time. However, my friend invited over this incredibly cute guy. I got so busy flirting with him that I let the oil overheat, so when I dropped the patties in the skillet, the oil exploded all over my boobs. I immediately took off my shirt and ran to the bathroom to clean off the hot oil, then spent half an hour rubbing ice all over the terrible burns on my chest to stop the blistering. It didn't work very well, and I still spent months with blisters and now scars all over my boobs.
—Tiranosaurio Rox, Facebook
7. "I cooked my arm."
I opened the oven door halfway to check on a batch of brownies, but I didn't realize the door was spring loaded. As I was sticking the toothpick in, the door shut on my arm. The hot metal on the edge of the door seared the bottom part of my forearm, and the top of my arm hit the element on the ceiling of the oven. I screamed and had to yank open the oven door to get my thoroughly cooked arm out.
8. "A ball of fire exploded in my face and set my hair on fire."
I bought a take away pizza that didn't require you to preheat the oven. After 30 minutes, I looked in and realized I hadn't lit the gas. For some reason, I put my head in the oven and pushed the ignition button, and a fire ball hit me in the face and set my hair on fire.
—Toria Heath, Facebook
9. "I fed my friends melted plastic chicken wings."
I was at a Super Bowl party, and my job was to make chicken wings for my friends. It was half time, so I was already half intoxicated. I plugged in the Fry Daddy, made the sauce, fried the wings, tossed them, and everyone chowed down. I did notice some strange black spots on the wings, but they didn't taste burnt, so we all ignored it and ate. I left the Fry Daddy at my friend's house and drunkenly walked home after the game.
The next day, I stopped at her house to pick it up, and we couldn't find the lid. Then we just stared at each other, horrified. I had melted the black plastic lid into the oil, which accounted for all the weird black spots. I fed all my friends melted plastic wings.
—Laura Meyer, Facebook
10. "I caught on fire while I was boiling water."
I caught on fire while I was boiling water on an electric stove with no flame. I had just gotten home from work and was wearing a cheap cardigan that was kind of flowy. I turned on the stove top to heat up a pot of water to cook some noodles for spaghetti.
I happened to be on the phone with my boyfriend as I was adding the noodles to the pot of water. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flame and flung my phone across the room while simultaneously screaming, "I'm on fire," and stripping out of my clothes and stomping the fire out. I guess my cardigan was just resting on the burner. Whoops.
—Amanda Flower, Facebook
11. "I watched the skin slide off my breast."
I was heating up soybeans in one of those microwavable steam packets. When it was done, I reached for them in the microwave, which was slightly above me. As I pulled them out, about two tablespoons of scalding water from the steam packet fell onto my chest. As I flailed and screeched and ran to my sink for cold water, I watched the skin actually slide off my breast. Soybeans literally gave me a second degree burn on my nipple.
12. "The knife pierced my palm, sending blood everywhere."
I was being lazy one night and decided to cook some frozen burgers from a box. I didn't want to wait for them to thaw out so I could separate them, so I took a kitchen knife and tried prying them apart. However, I pushed the knife a little too hard, and it went through the burgers, piercing my palm. I was so shocked that it didn't hurt at first, but blood was pouring from my hand. Needless to say, I never made those burgers. If I remember right, I said, "Fuck it," and ordered a pizza after that.
—Joe Purcell, Facebook
13. "My sister got her hands stuck in a mixer and had to have the beaters cut off."
My sister tried making a birthday cake for me when I was 3. Shortly after she'd begun, my mum heard her screaming, so she ran into the kitchen to find that my sister had gotten her hand stuck in the electric mixer. They tried ejecting the beaters, but that didn't work. My sister ended up having to go to the hospital with the whole mixer and the cord wrapped around her neck to get her hand cut out. The funny thing is my mum was more upset about the fact that her mixer was broken than she was about my sister nearly losing her hand.
—Lucy Meiklejohn, Facebook
14. "I exploded Jell-O."
I had no idea you couldn't boil water in a glass dish. As I added the Jell-O powder, there was a loud boom, and shards of glass and boiling water flew everywhere. I dove to the ground to avoid getting scalded. The entire kitchen was purple and sticky. That was the end of my culinary adventures.
—Joe Buron, Facebook
15. "I almost burned down the house cooking chicken."
My parents went away on vacation for the weekend, and I had the place to myself. I decided I'd cook a buttload of chicken fillets and pasta and just eat leftovers all weekend. My mom buys frozen chicken breasts, and normally I'd thaw them out in a pot of water for a couple hours, but I only gave them 30 minutes. I got my pan of olive oil nice and hot and put in the poorly defrosted chicken, and immediately the pan blew up in flames. I stood there for a millisecond just amazed at what just happened before grabbing the flaming pan and throwing it into the sink and turning on the faucet. After catching my breath, I realized all the white cabinets next to the stove, as well as the ceiling above, were covered in soot. I spent the next hour and a half scrubbing and cursing myself out for almost burning down the house when my parents weren't even on the plane yet.
—Amber R Kirkwood, Facebook
16. "The glass dish exploded into a million pieces."
I had just baked some chicken in a glass dish and put it in the sink to wash. As soon as it touched the water, it exploded, shattering into a million pieces. After I recovered, I pulled in the trash can from outside to clean up the mess, and there was a frog hanging out on the side of it, which hopped up on the counter and stared at me. After the glass explosion, I was so rattled that I started crying and had to get my next door neighbor who I didn't even know very well to come and get the frog out. Not my proudest moment.
—Morgan Lee, Facebook
17. "Oil exploded all over my body, giving me first degree burns."
I was working in a kitchen for my job, and as I reached for something on the top shelf, I knocked a can of cooking spray right into our deep fryer. I panicked and reached for a pair of tongs to remove the can. Unfortunately, when I grabbed the can, it exploded, splashing hot oil on my face, hands, and stomach and leaving me with first degree burns and an ambulance ride to the hospital.
18. "After cutting off the tip of my finger, I splashed hot oil all over my body."
I sprained my back in college and went on Vicodin for a week. The story should end here, but it doesn't. At my parents' house alone, I was in a weird fog from the medicine and was craving a fried egg cheese sandwich. Everything was fine till I cut the tip of my finger off with a knife. However, as I bent down, clutching my bloody finger, I knocked the pan off the stove. Hot grease spattered all over me, and my hand flew up to catch the pan. Blood was everywhere, I was burned in a thousand tiny little places, and my egg sandwich was ruined. I was already queasy from the Vicodin and laid down in the middle of the kitchen so I wouldn't pass out. I wrapped my finger in a paper towel, which did nothing to absorb the blood. Then my father came home and walked into the kitchen with a semi-conscious, bleeding girl lying in a bloody kitchen.
19. "I undercooked the chicken and gave my entire family food poisoning."
My dad was the best cook. He worked as a firefighter but still did all the cooking in our family. He passed away when I was 16. After a few weeks, our freezer was emptied of the casseroles that friends and neighbors had dropped off, and my siblings and I were faced with our mother's cooking for the first time in our lives. Let's just say that five Canadian kids did not like the weird mash-up of Eastern European dishes and her attempts at North American standards.
One day I came home from school and decided to make dinner. For the first time. Unsupervised. My dad had put food on the table for a family of seven without breaking a sweat. How hard could it be? I remember that I was making lemon-thyme chicken with rice and veggies. The recipe made four portions, but since there were six of us, I thought I'd simply double it. A while later, it was smelling great in the Hancock family kitchen.
However, I had forgotten to adjust the cooking time. So about an hour and a half, it all came back up. I gave my entire family food poisoning. All I can say is thankfully we had three bathrooms in our house.
