Spare Me!

I enjoy cooking. I love it actually (this seems to shock my mother every time I say it). If you have ever seen the Disney Pixar movie Ratatouille (which I watched twice yesterday!), I am like Remy, the cute little rat with an insatiable love of food, particularly cheese, and Paris. I am fascinated by the millions of creative food combinations that are possible. And when you combine that with the scientist in me that loves to experiment...well, my kitchen becomes my laboratory and I make some pretty..."inventive" stuff.
Sometimes my experiments center around what I can combine with what. Like can I put honey in a vinaigrette? Or grilled broccoli with pineapple? Can I combine a honey-viniagrette with grilled broccoli and pineapple?! Then sometimes it's about where I can use certain foods and spices. Can I put pepper in ice cream? (Answer is no by the way.) Can I put hot dogs in crepes? What about apples in shis-kabobs? Then sometimes it's just about cooking something I've never tried before, like my pie the other day, or some hither-to-unknown vegetable, or in this specific case, short ribs.
This past weekend I tried one of the most time consuming recipes I've ever attempted. And I started out using an actual recipe. And it was a disaster. This all came about, by the way, because I found a nice pack of short ribs on sale at the store the other day and decided to give it a try. (This is how many of my culinary adventures begin. I see some weird thing in the store or at the market and think "Hu. What in the heck is this? I don't know...it looks sketchy....but I'm totally going to by it and figure out how to cook it!")
I had to cut veggies, cook them, puree them, braise the ribs take them out of the pan, then make a sauce. Wine, tomato sauce, thyme, bay leaves etc. The sauce alone required mixing, boiling, reducing, simmering, more reducing. After which I added the meat back in...cooking longer..forever practically...and then finally when I tasted it it was...horrible!
It was really bitter for some reason. I guess I can't speak for anyone else, but I personally considered it inedible. I threw it in the crock pot and went for a run to think of what I could do to salvage my hard work. I opted to add brown sugar, a squeeze of honey, and some hazelnut coffee that was left in the pot from breakfast. I also added a ton more garlic salt and FINALLY it tasted...like food. Not great, but not as bad as before either.
We ate it. And neither of us died. So that's good. But I'd spent about $10 on extra stuff, including the whole bottle of wine the recipe called for, four hours of my life, and almost all of the minimally-allotted brain power I reserve for Sundays, on this less-than-satisfying meal. Boo. And I think I used every pot, pan, bowl, mixing instrument, and wooden spoon in my kitchen! And to top it all off, I don't even have a decent picture of it to post. No matter which way I shot the photo, it just looked like someone threw up red wine and pizza on pile of mashed potatoes! So frustrating. Sigh...you can't win 'em all I guess.