A Burning Feeling (but the Lasagna Tasted Good)

I missed the last two days of writing on my blog, and I feel guilty.  I was planning on writing on Sunday, but after church, three hours of Gluck Opera, and dinner out, I arrived home pretty exhausted....nothing like a full 13 hour day to wear you out.   Yesterday, I had all sorts of intentions of getting a ton done on all fronts.  Cleaning, practicing, language learning, a couple of special projects...none of it really got accomplished.   However, I did decide to make dinner for my mom and stepdad.  (I tried to give my mother a night off from cooking)I set out to bake lasagna.


Lasagna is a dish that I have made enough times that I don't use a recipe.  I have baked lasagna for two; I have baked lasagna for 30.   This is one dish I know how to make.  I have also learned how to make it quickly, mostly by "faking" the sauce a little.  Basically I take one bottle of "pre-made sauce" and add to it, stretching it and adapting it.  Last night's sauce started off as a bottle of Bertolli's Marinara with Burgundy Wine sauce.  To it I added the following:

• Ground beef
• a bell pepper
• a Vidalia onion (a sweet onion)
• roasted minced garlic
• olive oil
  
• a can of crushed tomatoes with garlic, basil, and oregano
• a can of tomato sauce
• freshly ground black pepper

Notice I added no salt. There is already salt in the bottled sauce and in the cheese.  Plus Mayor Bloomberg would be proud that I am limiting salt intake.

So...I get the lasagna into the oven.  From prep to oven I can get a lasagna whipped up in about 20-25 minutes.   I have dishes cleaned up, and all I have to do is wait to put the garlic bread (yeah I cheated here too) into the oven with about 9 minutes left on the pasta so they will be ready at the same time.   After 55 minutes baking, I pull off the aluminum foil top of dinner to let the cheese on the top finish.  I up the temp of the oven to 400 (from 375) and go to grab the bread from the fridge to start it. My step father is there so I ask him to pass me the bread...and this is where things get dicey.

I pull out a metal baking tray to place the bread on top of to throw it in the oven.  As I am about to throw the bread on the tray, my step father stops me and places a small piece of foil under the bread (so that cleaning the tray would be rendered non-essential.   We did not bend the edge of the foil around  the edge of the tray.  I just was trying to get the bread in the oven.   Little did I know how this attempt by him to "help me" with clean up would prove to be a costly mistake.

Ding...9 minutes are up and I go to grab the bread out of the oven.  I open the oven door and smell the garlic, wafting from the oven.  "This is going to be good!"    I reach down with an oven pad in my right hand to pull out the tray.   As I am lifting the tray...the bread on the aluminum foil beings to slide and tumble off of the tray.  Somewhere in the back of my grey matter, an alarm goes off.  "MUST SAVE BREAD"

In a split second it was over....and the cold water was rushing over my left hand.   I had rescued the slipping bread by steadying the tray with my unprotected left hand.   In that split second, my bare fingers had met the 400 degree metal tray.   By the time I had realized what I had done, it was too late.  I had burned the cr@p out of three fingers and a thumb.  (Yes, my pinky survived unscathed!)   Note, I don't blame my stepfather for any of this happening to me.

Now I don't have much of a threshold for pain.  Pain management for a borderline 2nd degree burn on your hand is not easy.   Cold numbs the pain, the aloe helps the pain.  Move your hand this way no stinging and burning sensation...two seconds later a sharp pain that makes you want to scream, "Just cut it off, just cut it off!"   Somehow, I got to sleep last night, while gripping an ice pack wrapped in a damp washcloth.

I will say that the burn is not as bad (thanks to the ice and aloe treatments last night) as I feared when I woke up this morning.  I have small blisters on all four fingers (not the pinky) and a slight tingling to the touch, but I am able to type with both hands today without any pain at all!  And you want to know what the best part of all of this is?   The lasagna turned out great yesterday, and I get to have leftovers today!