January 2003 “Cooking Disasters” Winner —
Lucien Smith

I was just starting to experiment with pastry and cakes and had made eclaires a few times, but had never made it with real fondant icing on top - the sort of icing you use on real eclaires and wedding cakes. I had never worked with sugar before, but figured I'd mastered puff pastry so I must be able to anything. Unfortunately, I didn't realize how important it was to have a good candy thermometer and pulled the sugar off the oven at the wrong time. My cookbook said to put the hot sugar on a marble slab which I didn't have, but luckily I was at home from college, so I decided that my mother's new marble countertop should be fine. But because the sugar was not at the right temperature and the marble was not oiled, my sugar paste turned into a giant glob of super glue that not even her best kitchen knife could get off easily. After hours of scraping, I finally got it off. I've taken to buying my eclaires at the bakery.

Lucien Smith

Prize:

• Cooking Disasters: Snakebite Salsa Picosa
  El Paso Chile Company