HAMBURGER STEAK FAILED BIG TIME

Can you imagine, the best hitter in the major leagues standing at the plate, bases loaded, two outs, he is the winning run if he belts a homer, and boom his team would win the World Series. Imagine, it's all on the line. The count is full, the pitcher winds up, and delivers a high 97 mph fast ball, he swings and misses. The winning team is jumping up and down, while the best hitter in the game feels like a goat! Hey we all have been there haven't we? We are the best at what we do at our jobs. Maybe you are the best bus driver, always on time, your bus is always clean, and well maintained. However, there's always that one day, when it seems routine, only for it to blow up in your face. Your bus decides to die out. All was checked out, but it died out! People on your route will be late for work, school, and whatever. You become the goat. "Hey man, you never seem to fail, but you did today man!" Or you could be an air traffic controller. You follow all FAA procedures, but oops, you told a pilot of a small aircraft to cross the runway to make it to the gates, but forgot a 767 is landing. Bamm! Disaster! No one survives! OK, let's get to me. That's right me. This blog is my blog, so it's about me. But not succeeding. Failing. Who do I blame? Got to blame somebody right? Of course, that's what we do as people. Things fail, we look stupid, we blame someone or something. We have to. Forget all that goody goody stuff, morals and all that nonsense. Hey blame someone, it's the American way. Look at our president. 

Today I made a pound of hamburger steaks. But- when I was finished cooking it all up, it looked bad, as in, "This looks like shit! And how come there's no nice beefy aroma off the pan?" Really it looked like shit so I did not want to get my iPhone out and take photos, screw that shit!

Now we all know when we cook beef, or sear it, there's a nice aroma coming off of the pan, and the ground beef develops a nice brown exterior. But what? What the ____ck?! These four patties look livid. I tasted one, and believe it or not, it really tasted like freezer burn. I won't say where I bought this meat, because most of the time, this market is on it. This was a freak shitter, a product that a human would not enjoy no matter how hungry he or she was. Guess what? Yep, the dogs loved it. I hated it. Tasted crappy. Freezer burn crappy. This was my hamburger steak failure. I blame the butcher that grounded the meat and packaged it. I blame the store that sold it. I blame the county for something, and I blame the state of Hawaii for something, I blame you the reader of this post for something!

I did everything by to book, by the International Society of Hamburger Steak Lovers Association. I seasoned the ground beef with salt and pepper, added some bread crumbs, and an egg. Washed my hands really well, and mixed the beef and its ingredients. Used a hot skillet with a little cooking oil and cooked it. But the beef just didn't look right even as it was cooking, no aroma nothing. Luckily I wasn't cooking for any client, just for the home. But I could not feed this thing I made to a family member, it was just sick. As it sucked sick. So cooks can have bad days too, just as bad as the best hitter in baseball. Just as the best whoever. 

So what do I do now when my cooking confidence is shot? I move forward. Apparently the ground beef was not handled right in the back before packaging, or something. Maybe there was a tiny hole in the plastic wrap, maybe? Hmm, if so, all the refrigerated air would seep into the meat. All that negative aroma in the chiller making a home in the good quality ground beef. Because the meat looked good, it didn't look bad, it's just after the cooking, I knew the meat was bad somehow, it just tasted awful. Even a novice cook cannot really mess up ground beef. It's simple to cook, just season it with what you like, and fry em up. The beef itself has flavor, so it should work. But not on this night. It was a failure night. But I'll keep my head up, and if someone hires me, I gotta pray it will turn out right. Sometimes in life, we can do everything right, we have our checklist and we checked off all the important stuff we need to do to succeed. But something out of the blue, out of nowhere will derail what you are doing. It will derail your success. It's not if guys, it's when you will fail. We will, sooner or later. Because cooking this dish, it never ever failed. Even if I used too little salt, people still ate it all. But this time, was the first time I did everything right for this hamburger steak meal, and somehow it failed big time!

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