What’s that saying….”Failure is the stepping stone to success” or something like that.  I wanted to share some things I’ve recently learned with my readers to prevent you from making the same mistakes.

#1.  Wear glasses while cutting onions.

The lenses will prevent the onion’s chemical from getting into your eyes and you won’t cry. “Onions produce the chemical irritant known as syn-propanethial-S-oxide. It stimulates the eyes’ lachrymal glands so they release tears.” (Quote from recipes.howstuffworks.com)

2.  Put a cookie sheet under your pie crust when baking.

The reason being, if whatever you are baking should boil over it is much easier to clean a cookie sheet than the baking element in the bottom of your oven.

3.  Put wax paper under the rice when you prebake your pie crust.

I made a tomato pie recently and the recipe called for me to prebake the pie crust before filling it with all the goodness that is tomato pie.  The crust puffed up and cracked a bit.  To prevent this the second time I filled the crust with uncooked rice (this weighs down the bottom) and prebaked. You can use dried beans as well.  The one thing I didn’t do was put a barrier between the rice and pie shell.  Oops.  Hence, I spent the next 5 minutes picking rice out of my shell. Wax paper is your friend.