I stirred it and stirred it…
In seventh grade home ec class, our diligent teacher told us over and over again to always read an entire recipe from start to finish before even gathering the ingredients. She was handing out the grades, so I complied.
Six years later, a million months pregnant with our second child, I called my mother-in-law for her famous fudge recipe. We had to have fudge for Christmas.
“It’s on the back of the [marshmallow] Fluff jar,” she said. “‘Never-Fail Fudge.’”
She underestimated me.
I heeded the advice of that seventh-grade teacher, standing in the grocery store aisle to read the entire recipe. Mom-in-law never used nuts (*optional), but I thought, “Hey, what the heck?” and tossed some walnuts into the cart. Thinking always gets me into trouble.
The recipe has you combine the first five ingredients and bring them to a boil over “moderate” heat while stirring constantly, but “don’t mistake escaping air bubbles for boiling.” 1) I don’t have a “moderate” setting on my stove. 2) I hear a watched pot never boils, and let me tell you, it sure felt like never. 3) Do you have any idea how long it takes ANYTHING to boil when you keep it moving?
And so it was that 100 years later, my arm was very tired. I upped the heat. And stirred faster. (Because while a watched pot won’t boil, it WILL burn.) Finally, it came to a boil, and I stirred for another five minutes as directed. As I added the vanilla and two 12-ounce packages of chocolate chips, my nephew and brother, both in their early teens, appeared on the scene. There is another word for teenage boys in the kitchen: stirrers.
“Here,” I said, handing the whisk to my nephew. “Stir this until the chocolate chips melt.”
Little brother watched, and I started preparing stuffing for the following day.
“It’s still lumpy,” the boys reported about 10 minutes later.
They had changed shifts.
Thinking they were crazy, I peered into the pot. Sure enough, it was still lumpy. Husband enters the kitchen with our 3-year-old hot on his heels. All five of us peer into the pot. The whisk passes to hubby to beat the cauldron of bubbling goo into glossy smoothness. All three boys stare into the pot as if it holds the key to life.
Forty minutes and several more shift changes later, the stuffing is done. The fudge is still lumpy and rapidly cooling off, our buttered Pyrex dish patiently standing by.
“What the *#@$+>%@#@?” I said, reaching for the jar of Fluff.
I re-read the recipe from top to bottom. Then I saw it: One cup of chopped walnuts (*optional), and I began to laugh. I couldn’t catch my breath and couldn’t speak. Tears ran down my face. I sat down.
“What is wrong with you?” my nephew asked.
Where should I start? But I pointed at the jar and doubled over again.
“Stop stirring,” he said to hubby. “She’s been trying to get us to beat the nuts smooth for an hour now!”
They’ve never let me live it down and swear to this day it was deliberate. Flash forward… I don’t think I’ve made “Never-Fail Fudge” fudge since that incident in 1983, but I decided a few years ago I wanted to do something nice for my neighbors and co-workers. How can you go wrong with chocolate? Put me in charge of it, that’s how.
The recipe allegedly makes “about five pounds.” I thought about how many people to whom I’d like to give fudge and decided to quadruple the batch. (Except that I’m pumpkin-pie-math challenged – every time I make I make a single pumpkin pie recipe, it makes two – and didn’t realize it extended to fudge.) I start by losing two bags of chocolate chips. They probably are in a gift bag somewhere. I decide to go with a triple batch.
I get the largest Dutch oven we have and begin adding ingredients. By the time I got five (or was it six?) of the 15 required cups of sugar into the pot, it is an inch from the top. It is clear there is no way the other 10 cups of sugar are going to fit. Enter mother-in-law’s kettle.
“That pot isn’t any bigger than the other one,” husband says while walking through the kitchen.
“Yes, it is,” I reply.
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is.”
Kids: “God, you guys sound like a couple of kids!”
“Girls, don’t let your mother talk you into stirring out the lumps.”
“Why don’t you go back to working on the car if YOU don’t want some lumps?”
I dump pot A into pot B and add the rest of the sugar. Now THIS pot is about an inch or so from the top. Forgetting the laws of physics revolving around the reaction of objects to heat, when the pot finally comes to a boil, its expanded contents are at critical mass. There will be no room for the six bags of chocolate chips. Probably not even for the three teaspoons of vanilla and a single chocolate chip.
“There’s no room in that pot for the chocolate chips,” says Captain Obvious on another trip through the kitchen. “Did you double the recipe?”
“No.”
“You shouldn’t have doubled the recipe.”
“I didn’t double the recipe. I tripled it.”
The family is gathered in fascination, probably wondering how I will get myself out of the mess.
“Listen, you; I’m not out in the driveway telling you how to replace that head gasket, so you don’t come in here and tell me how to make the fudge,” I said. “Can you get me the big roaster?”
“It’s no bigger than that pot,” he replies.
“Yes, it is.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is.”
“No, it’s not.”
Kids: “Ugh.” They were circulating around the kitchen like operating room technicians. Pyrex dishes of every size, shape and color were buttered; whisks, potholders, cooling racks and spatulas were compiled. Our youngest stood at the ready, chocolate chips in hand.
“Get’em in the roaster!” I barked.
The first bag explodes, sending about one-quarter of the chips skittering across the stove. Activity halts. I keep stirring (because nobody’s falling for that lump thing).
“Do we have anything resembling chocolate in the pantry?”
“Baker’s chocolate,” replies older daughter.
Younger daughter is still putting chips in the roaster. I calculate the odds (more math) of some unsweetened baking chocolate making a discernible difference in a recipe containing 36 ounces of marshmallow Fluff, 15 (16?) cups of sugar and (nearly) six 12-ounce bags of chocolate chips. Answer? Not bloody likely.
“Dump in two squares,” I ordered. “Make it four.”
Hubby took the cauldron of bubbling goo and poured it over the chips, which melted in about 20 seconds. Hubby and I beat the contents to a glossy finish in the roasting pan, then ladled the contents into their final resting places, ready for delivery Christmas day. After Christmas dinner, I made a request of my family.
“I want a bigger pot for Christmas.”
Martha E. Conway is publisher of the Madison County Courier.