Welcome to the Best Kitchen Disaster Story Contest. Enter your story to win a one year, unlimited Main Course ChefsLine's subscription (a $230 value). Let our professional chef team put the fun back into cooking!

Kitchen Disaster

Here at ChefsLine, the culinary hotline, we’re all about cooking empowerment. But we realize that even the most accomplished, confident cook can feel less than powerful at times. And those times always seem to coincide with occasions on which you’re trying to make a great impression on a group of people, don’t they?

Remember the time the tall-as-the-table Great Dane ate the entire roast right before all your guests were about to sit down, leaving you with no main course for your dinner for eight? Or the Thanksgiving you made your signature macaroni and cheese and realized the milk was spoiled after everyone had taken the first bite? Or the time… we won’t go on, because it’s just too painful, but you get the idea.

Tell us about your most tragic, most memorable, or most hysterically funny holiday fiasco or dinner party disaster, and you could win a year of free cooking advice. That’s right, if our panel of judges picks your story, ChefsLine will come to your rescue for an entire year.

Grand Prize: One full year of cooking instruction and advice through ChefsLine, the culinary hotline. Prize valued at $230. Includes unlimited access to the culinary hotline and online chat. Access to over twenty professional chefs whenever you need that "extra hand" in the kitchen and schedule lessons to explore new cuisines.

First Prize: ChefsLine Essentials Gift Box including essential kitchen gadgets preferred by ChefsLine chefs. Includes complimentary cooking session.

Twenty Second Prizes: A free personalized cooking session with one of ChefsLine's team of twenty professional chefs, pastry chefs, wine consultants, and cookbook authors.

Eligibility: Open to U.S. residents, 18 and older. Entries will be accepted from October 16, 2006 at 5:00 pm EST until November 5, 2006 at 5 pm EST. One entry per person. Winner(s) will be selected on or about November 15, 2006. Winner(s) will be contacted by email or phone and list posted here.

Entries: All entries must be submitted through ChefsLine official entry form. All entries must be original work of the entrant. All entries must be 250 words or fewer.

Judging: Stories will be scored based on scope of disaster, repercussions, and the groan factor for our understanding judges who are home cooks like you.

Do you Suffer from KPA?

Click here for a curious study of Kitchen Performance Anxiety that first inspired us to create ChefsLine, the culinary hotline. Our chefs wear white coats, have great kitchen-side manner, and get KPA sufferers back on their feet and in the kitchen. We could go on....but make one call and please call us in the morning and tell us all about your great dinner party.

Hotline

 

The Winners!

What can we say? These 289 stories made us laugh, cry, and definitely emboldened ChefsLine chefs to continue saving hundreds of home cooks from similar fates. It was hard to pick winners, but these twenty-three home cooks reminded us all why cooking is always memorable. And here they are....

Grand Prize Winner

Michele B. from Taunton, MA.

Well done, Michele! We've often wondered why our ovens have a self-cleaning button. Click here to read Michele's story.

Help!

First Prize Winner

Margaret H. from Shaw Air Force Base, SC.

The ChefsLine judges could not resist this story of a first love over a soggy pizza. Click here to read Maggie's story.

Pizza by Aldenwalden, Flickr

Special Prize for Best Thanksgiving Story

Ronni F. from Buffalo, NY.

Wow! Best save by a home cook that we've heard. Must have been your guests' most memorable and delicious Thanksgiving. Click here to read Ronni's story.

Sterno

Our Second Prize Winners

Ana - Arden, NC
Angie - Marion, NC
Becky - Killen, AL
Beth - Crestwood, IL
Bonnie - Lake Ronkonkoma, NY
Carolyn - Rochester, NY
Clint - Port Orange, FL
Connie - Grand Prairie, TX
Cynthia - Las Vegas, NV
Elizabeth - Corona, CA
Jennifer - Arlington, TX
Jenny - Huntington, IN
Katherine - Springfield, OH
Kathryn - Holly, MI
Keri - Lodi, CA
Laura - Arthur City, TX
Rebecca - Melissa, TX
Rena - Oklahoma City, OK
Sandy - Springdale, AR
Sarah - Eagan, MN

 

Michele's Kitchen Disaster Story

I was once broiling a steak in my oven when all of a sudden, it started to flare up. I panicked and bumped the oven door close. The first thing I did was to go and turn off the oven but, in a frantic, I accidentally hit the oven self-cleaning button. Never using this or knowing what I had done, all I knew was that now the oven door had locked on me and the oven was heating up furiously. I started to scream for my mother who was upstairs while I was yanking on the door in tears. She finally got the oven to turn off but not before more damage was done. Not only had I ruined dinner and damaged the oven, but scared both myself and my family out of our wits.

 

Maggie's Kitchen Disaster StoryPizza by Aldenwalden, Flickr

One Sunday after my husband David, my then first boyfriend, first started dating my family invited him over for pizza after church. Now when I was growing up EVERYTHING was homemade, including pizza. Which was great. The only thing we did different this time was mom bought four Chef-Boy-R-Dee pizza kits with lots of fixin's.

To save time, I made the pizza's on Saturday, wrapped them with plastic wrap and put them in the freezer. This was the first meal I had ever cooked for my then future husband... so I wanted everything to be perfect.

We went to church, came home and I pulled the pizzas out of the freezer and popped them into the oven. I had the table set beautifully. Mom let me use her good china... (for pizza, I know, silly... but she knew I wanted everything to be great). The pizzas smelled yummy and looked even better when they came out of the oven...

We all sat down at the table and my dad said grace... then proceeded to dole out slices of hot, gooey, cheezy pizza to everyone... NO REALLY... It REALLY was hot, GOOEY pizza. I didn't adjust the temperature or the cooking time to allow for cooking a raw frozen pizza!!!

The crust was done only half-way to the center... It had set up just enough to be picked up by the pizza spatula. But it was pure goop underneath all those yummy toppings and melted cheese. Well, my folks got a good laugh out of it. I was mortified. David was sweet. While the rest of us ate what part of the crust we could eat... my wonderful, darling, and sweet future husband sat there and ate all of not just one piece of pizza... but several !!! My mom and dad kept telling him he didn't have to eat the middle... he did it anyway... and looked at me and smiled with every bite...I still don't know how he did it. Especially since after 15 years of marriage I know what a picky eater he can be. All I can say is that he loved me... even then... he loved me enough to eat pure raw pizza dough with all the trimmings... Even after all these years I don't think he has totally disliked anything I've fixed. Unless it had broccoli or green peas in it... and I learned quick to stay away from those... he won't touch anything with either in it...There have been a few mild cooking disasters since then but I haven't quite as horrified as I was on horrible doughy day.

 

Ronni's Kitchen Disaster Story

Thanksgiving. Turkey in oven. Twenty guests coming in one hour. TOTAL POWER FAILURE! Ended up slicing turkey into strips and threading it on skewers. Made a quick peanut sauce. Finished cooking turkey over a propane camp stove. Ah! The traditional turkey sate with all the trimmings. All heated up on the camp stove and over candles/sterno cans in chafing dishes and fondue pots.