My Kitchen Floor is Shiny, and that's Not Necessarily a Good Thing.

My kitchen floor is clean--and this is not a good thing.  You would think having a shiny kitchen floor would make me happy, and usually this would be a fair statement .  But, the path to cleanliness is often messy.  Let me elaborate.

I decided I was hungry for chile rellanos.  A lady I work with is from Brazil, and she makes fabulous rellanos.  Since it would most certainly be an abuse of my authority as a manager to cajole her into making them just because I am hungry for them, I decided to make them myself. 

So, I broiled, skinned, and cleaned the guts out of the poblano peppers, then stuffed them with cheese.  After they were battered, I went to fry them.  Now, this is where the fun comes in.  Since the divorce, I live in an apartment.  An apartment with a tiny galley kitchen.  A tiny galley kitchen that is about 3.7 inches from the fire alarm.  I swear, I can't boil water without the alarm going off.  So, any time I cook, I have a big plastic cutting board at the ready to go wave fan-like in front of the stupid thing to direct the non-existent smoke the other way.  (I think it must be hungry, and it is yelling at me for not offering it anything to eat)

In any event, I was standing in front of the stove, frying the rellanos and even though I KNOW the alarm is likely to go off, I jumped about a mile into the air when it did.  In the process, I knocked the handle of the skillet, and splashed hot oil onto the burner.  You know what happens when hot oil gets on the burner?  You got it... FIRE!  Now, I grew up cooking on an amazing gas stove, and if you watch any cooking shows, you know that chefs aren't fazed by a bit of flame.  (Funny side-note, the alarm was eerily silent while there were actual FLAMES in the kitchen.  Odd, huh?)  I went to move the skillet off the burner, and do something I should have done in the first place, put it on the back burner.  Splash.  More grease, this time, on the floor. 

I wiped up the worst of the grease, and it really did make the floor shine.  Shine=Slick.  So, imagine me trying to finish frying the rellanos and not fall down on a floor that now has now become a shiny oil-skating rink. I am still in Physical Therapy for a knee injury from a recent car accident, so this in itself was a challenge. 

I finally got the rellanos all fried, and safely into the oven to bake, and I surveyed the kitchen.  No wonder I roll my eyes when my daughter asks me why I don't like to cook for her.  Batter covered counter, including the handles on the sink, flecks of flour everywhere, poblano pepper skins in the sink, and an oil slick on the floor.  Not even going to mention what the stove top looked like, not much gives me nightmares, but that might. 

I am happy to say that the kitchen is now probably cleaner than it has been in a while.  I guess that's a good thing, but wow, that was a lot of work just for a chile rellano. 

After you're done laughing at my cooking mis-adventure, I'm sure your next question is "What about the chile rellanos?"  Here it is.  Not as good as Maria's, but not bad, either!