A Cooking Accident

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There was some chicken in the fridge that I had been meaning to use before it went bad. I thought it had a few days left (the date on the package seemed to reflect that too), but it was bad, so my original plan was thrown in the trash. I hurriedly dug through the freezer searching for a suitable thing to fry and emerged with some more chicken. The idea was to cook chicken tacos; it would just take longer now because the chicken I was going to use was frozen solid.

After rinsing the chicken in hot water to speed along the thawing process I slashed into it with a knife, carving off the softer edges and working my way toward the frozen center. After I had cut off enough ckicken to start frying I stopped to allow the center chunks a bit more time to thaw.

Britt and I recently bought some exotic asian sauces and spices with experimentation in mind; my plan was “Chinese themed” chicken tacos, and I readied the spices accordingly. The first batch of chicken worked out fairly well, it even gave a warning of the impending danger that eventually overwhelmed the kitchen. Toward the end of the chicken’s sautee cycle I added some hot chili oil (remember the “Chinese theme?”). As soon as the hot oil hit the pan spicy hot steam burst into the air and then flowed deep into my lungs, I was standing back, slightly anticipating such a development, but coughing set in nonetheless.

Things weren’t bad yet, sure the air had some hot oil in it, but not that much–I figured it would go away pretty quick. With the first batch of chicken safely out of the way, my opportunity to experiment with the left over (now thawed) chicken was begging to be exercised in the strongest way.

I love spicy food.

My plan was to completely soak the experimental chicken in hot chili oil and then to slather it with Sriracha sauce–my taste buds would be served up a fiery treat! I think my fierce desire for really spicy chicken clouded my better judgment, because the “warning” I had received from the earlier chicken had no impact on my decisions. I proceeded with my massive doses of hot oil and Sriracha sauce on the chicken in the hot frying pan and was immediately rewarded with a vindictive cloud of spicy air whose only mission seemed to be the complete destruction of my lungs. Fits of coughing took over as the vaporized sauce burning itself deep into my throat–our entire apartment was filled with nearly unbreathable spicy air. A window was opened, but that wasn’t good enough, Britt and I actually had to go outside to clear our lungs!

You will be glad to know that our lungs are still intact, but I’m sure our fate nearly took a much spicier turn for the worse… We did eat some of the chicken–it didn’t really turn out that good, but that is what experiments are for, right?