Quarantined People Are Sharing Their Failed Baking Attempts And Here Are 30 Of The Funniest Ones
We’re all craving something sweet and soothing during the quarantine. So why not try out that banana bread recipe that's been hanging on your fridge for over two years now? I mean, the ten boxes of eggs, aka your coronapocalypse hoard, ain't gonna bake themselves.
The pans are flying in no time and the solo baking show is on. The timer goes off and there you have it—a doughy monstrosity and impressive baking fail. Bored Panda has collected the most unsuccessful attempts right down below that will hopefully spark your inner chef, because whatever you make… it can’t be that bad. Been there, baked that? Share your quarantine bake-off stories in the comments!
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Just don’t ask...
You’re not the only one considering making banana bread. The global pandemic has turned many into avid home bakers. In fact, there are so many of them that suppliers have been forced to increase production.
Bloomberg reports that baking staples have become a sort-of luxury. Baking yeast sales were up 457% over last year for the week ending March 28. Flour was up 155%, butter up 73%, baking powder up 178%, and eggs up 48%.
Robert Harper, the president at Hopkinsville Milling Co., said the company is packing twice as much flour as usual. Harper commented: “It started to look like Thanksgiving and Christmas all rolled into one. People have time on their hands and are trying to save some money.”
Cut them up post bake when they’re still a little soft. Or if they’re a little hard crumble them up into large chunks and sprinkle on ice cream. Nom.
My make-shift attempt at making a bunny failed me, but I think I baked a fat cat instead?
Bored Panda contacted Beth Coombes, a professional pastry chef and the owner of bespoke bakery Pili Pala Cakehouse, who told us about everything you need to know to bake in quarantine like a pro.
Beth suggests always reading your recipe in full before just going for it. “Baking is such a science and things must be done in the correct order to achieve the end result you want,” she explained. Plus, always weigh your ingredients before starting so you can concentrate on the method while making it.
So...this looked to be baking perfectly and happily in the oven...this was the surprise on the other side
The pastry chef named a couple of beginner’s mistakes that are best to avoid. One of the most common ones is setting the oven to the right temperature. “Cakes cook on so many different temperatures to get different results, so don’t think 'ah, this temp will do,' as it might not work, and you’ll learn that the hard way.”
Another common mistake that anyone who is new to baking could make is simply not knowing the technique. “For example, 'beating' or 'folding' techniques. If you’re not sure what a word means, give it a little google first and you’ll be good to go.”
If you can decide on a recipe to try out when in quarantine, Beth has shared her super-easy salted caramel brownies recipe with all the Pandas out there. The ingredients you’ll need are: 170g dark chocolate, 170g unsalted butter, 3 eggs, 225g caster sugar, 50g cocoa, 50g plain flour, ½ tsp sea salt, 100g salted caramel.
“Preheat your oven to 150℃ and line a 11”/8” tin. First, melt the chocolate and butter together and leave to cool for a couple of minutes. Then, whisk your eggs and sugar together until combined before adding your chocolatey butter mixture. Continue to gently whisk until it all comes together, then add your cocoa powder, flour, and salt. Fold this together, to make sure it’s all smooth and combined—it will be super-thick and shiny.”
“Lastly, add half of your salted caramel to the brownie, fold, and combine. Pour this in the tin, then drizzle and swirl the other half through the brownie. Give it a couple of taps on the table to level it out and bake it in the oven for 20-25 minutes.”
“Once ready, it should still be a little wobbly in the center, but crusted and set around the edges. You must leave this to cool for a few hours before cutting into squares and indulging—trust me, it will totally be worth it!” Bon appetit!
Baking fail. My macarons exploded and didn’t grow feet.
I’m pretty sure it had to do with my almond flour. I made my own and I think it was too moist. I haven’t been able to find ready made almond flour but almonds are readily available. I’m gonna try again
In my attempt at making pizza, i discovered my yeast had expired in 2010. And the supermarkets had ran out of yeast. Then I read about making yeast from dried fruit. I used dried longan and here is an interesting outcome. The dough was stretchy and after baking, I ended up with a very pleasant tasting crispy and slightly chewy sweetish flatbread. It went really well with crunchy peanut butter
You can store yeast in the freezer. I've got some that's at least 2 years old and still works fine.
Try chilling the assembled cookies before baking them, and reduce the leavening?
Sadly my challahday easter bunny didn't quite work out. Seems to have come down with some hip dysplasia, ear disconnection, and a touch of elephantiasis in the oven... I think the main culprits here were uneven working of the various strands, slight underproofing, and perhaps some rusty baking skills. Next time..
I think I made the peanut butter cookies a bit too big.
I tried to make pretzels and they went MUTANT
i am normally a good baker. i found a recipe for egg custard pie. i told my husband 2 go 2 the store to get the ingredients (only 1 person per family is allowed in the store and i cannot be trusted because i come home with a whole bunch of junk food lol). 1 of the ingredients were pie crust, i told him the pie crust are in the refrigerated section near the eggs and where the cookie dough is. he came home with pie crust from the freezer in a pie plate already....i have never seen these in my life and the pie dish was not deep. this was the outcome of using pie crust i have never made before. apparently the egg custard somehow got under the pie crusts while baking, and that big bubble in the middle is the pie crust
Lesson 1. Make your own pie crust. Lesson 2. Pastry formula: half fat to flour. EG. 8 oz flour 4 oz fat. Lesson 3. Use butter, freeze it, grate it into the flour, cut together with a butter knife, add COLD water( 1/4 to 1/2 a cup) gradually, stirring gently until dough comes together, leave in fridge for 30 mins before rolling out (this lets the gluten in the flour relax and stops the pastry being tough) Enjoy
Or poke holes in crust and blind bake for 10-15 min so this doesn't happen.
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Looks like that pan was way too small for a custard pie. It's neither wide nor deep enough. Nothing to do with the dough except it wasn't pre-baked before filling. I've made them, too, and you can *not* use a small pie pan, and you need to prebake the shell.
You need to poke the crust with a fork to allow steam to escape while cooking, or this can happen.
Turn that custard pie into a pot pie right before your very eyes
You have to poke tiny holes in the crust before you put the filling in. The bubble is caused by steam/heat under the crust. Punching holes with a fork allows it to be released.
the frozen ones often come that way, let it warm up and pinch any cracks together, then egg wash the shell and pre-bake the shell for 10 minutes before you put the filling in then fill it and bake it and you will have a much different outcome,
The frozen ones are often cracked, let it warm up and pinch it back together first, also egg wash the inside and top of the crust and prebake 10 minutes before filling it and baking it to complete it..you will get a much different outcome
At least you don't have to clean the oven. That's the best thing ever!
My friend sent her husband to the store for zucchini and basil. He came home with a cucumber and parsley. When I send my husband to the store—WITH a list AND photos—he still manages to call me 3-5 times to ask questions. Moral of the story: Don’t send husbands to the store.
hm, English isn't my first language - could you please write more specific instructions & recipe, how to bake this exquizite-looking UFO pie? asking for a friend..
Next time poke holes in the bottom of the crust with a fork and bake the crust partially before putting in the custard....
Because shes smart enough to use a sheet pan
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Is that oven new? It is do clean. Have you ever baked before. Maybe you should let your bake as well as shop😎
Note: this post originally had 45 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
turns out angel food cake turns into a cake golem if you put it in the nordicware ghost pan. ghostttt-5...143aea.jpg
still epic
That's hilarious!
some of you just need to make sure you: spread your cookies out on the tray, only fill cake tins/cases 3/4 of the way, Keep your designs simple, THEY ARE (hopefully) GOING TO RISE/SPREAD
Also: Chill your cookie dough before baking!
Thanks, Bunzilla. I did not know that.
What I learned today is: take a pic of everything you cook in the oven before, just in case. At least I'll have an evidence of what I tried to do :)
Qq123123, but you can't find the decency to use proper grammar when telling us about a job? Scam.
It’s a bot, they’re annoying but just downvote them and BP will get rid of the account.
*grammar (sorry)
Omg Aragorn ll Elessar, I did not even notice that! 😆 I must look pretty stupid lol
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I earned $5000 ultimate month by using operating online only for 5 to 8 hours on my computer and this was so smooth that i personally couldn’t accept as true with before working on this website......>>>https://bit.ly/2O5A9Xc
I am sitting here laughing at these while knowing that if I were to try ANY of these the results would be as bad or much, much worse ☺.
I do bake. And now I know where all of the flour and yeast went during the first week of lockdowns... "Let's do some fun family stuff! Baking! Baking is easy!" ... ... buahahahhahaha*snort*hahahaha
I really was hungry hungry hungry for sourdough bread. But I live in one of the most dangerous CV hotspots in the US. I'm not going to risk death by CV for a piece of bread. No problem! I got my sister to send me a long-forgotten 1983 recipe she wrote down watching my Grandma make her really really really good bread. She scribbled here notes on a pad as G-mom mixed everything. So I made it. I misread the amount of salt. Instead of two teaspoons, I put in two tablespoons. OOPS.... I am not enough of a cook to catch that mistake. Now I know what salt water fish taste when they sip a little drink from the ocean... It got eaten. I choked it down with a smile, and edited the recipe.
I went to a pastry making cooking camp and the recipe called for a 1/4 of a teaspoon vanilla extract. Instead my partner puts in a 1/4 CUP! That’s about 8 dollars btw
Unlike just simple cooking..baking is a science. You have to follow the measurements and the instructions to the letter. You can't just toss ingredients into a bowl and hope for the best. This is one reason I'm an excellent cook, but a lousy baker. I can throw ingredients into a dish and make a great casserole or 3 course dinner...but I can't make cookies without them turning out flat and chewy....
But I like flat chewy cookies.
Yes! Yes! Lets hear it for flat chewy cookies! I totally agree.
Baking just takes practice. With cooking, a lot of times, you can taste the dish at pivotal points and adjust spices, thickness, etc. With baking, you don't realize mistakes until it's done, or too late to make changes. I've been baking so long I can just tell when it's right... Or not right. Just keep trying, you'll get the hang of it.
Same!
This comment has been deleted.
At least they tried. I love that everyone is getting back to basics, learning things they either haven't done before, or trying to improve upon long forgotten skills. I've seen some bakers/cooks "gatekeeping" things like flour and yeast. They get angry that people are taking these things from the supermarket, when they're not sure what to do with it. I think it's great. No one is going to be perfect straight away; you might have to make glue a thousand times before you get edible pasta. I'm trying my hand at sewing again, and I'm really, really bad at it. Only one way to improve though.
Baking is not for the impatient, you need to make sure you're keeping a close eye on whatevers in your oven, otherwise you're likely to forget and burn, at least if you're a beginner. If you're not though, you get to the point you instinctively know to bake something for "X" amount of minutes. But honestly, I've been baking since childhood, and I'm 24 now, and still make mistakes, happens to all of us!
There's pics here I can't unsee. Thanks for the laughs bakers!
Baking takes practise. Pre heating is very important. Probably worth buying an oven thermometer to check it is getting to the correct temp.
Definitely get an oven thermometer. And put it in different spots in the oven periodically. My first oven was so old, the numbers were worn off on the knob. Also, it had a hot spot on the left back side. It was free, so I didn't complain, but a thermometer was VERY helpful.
I'd be in a world of hurt without mine. I have literally worn out my brand new stove in four years! Two burners get super hot with no warning, and the oven runs between 10 to 25 degrees too hot and has a hot spot in the same place as yours does! They aren't built to be used daily anymore. What I wouldn't give to have my Nan's old reliable GE right now.
I applaud all these people trying to cook at home! It's not easy and requires more talent and time than imagined. I'm 58, love to cook and I've screwed up a few new recipes since lock down. I'm on my 7th recipe for biscuits. Gee whiz, what fun!
Chill your cookie dough....
my sister (who is a pretty good baker for the most part) was making cookies and we didn't have any butter, so she used ghee (nasty i hate that stuff) and lets just say the cookies didn't turn out and the house stunk for hours... :/
Oops. It's the bit they take out of ghee (clarified butter) that you really need for cookies. It was worth a shot though, a lot of very tasty recipes are the result of "mistakes".
Ghee is the literal inverse of baking butter?
This comment has been deleted.
^^ How's that possible hahahaha!!!
🤤 or ಠಿ_ಠ
I burned chocolate. Don`t ask.
I had thought my baking was bad since I started during the quarantine but seeing this made me not loose hope, I'm still better🤣🤣
A little practice and you'll be an expert - now's the perfect time!
Great point Hans, why don’t you make a post about something else in that case? I can’t wait to see it
I'd eat most of this anyway :3
I’ve been baking and there is one thing I learned. Never bake raisins. Ever.
Hans, most posts are usually about current things, and since quarantine is current, that is a popular topic to be posted about, since it is relatable.
You are correct, buy I think Hans is maybe getting sick of the literal 24/7 quarantine stuff that's on the news, on BP, everywhere. It would be nice to get a little variety, like when stores around xmas play normal songs mixed in with the xmas music.
This comment has been deleted.
OMG I’ve never laughed so hard!
What's just as bad: Hubby wanted pumpkin pie. Made it from scratch (used pumpkin from our own garden too), used a tart crust recipe and tin, because he HATES crust. Dialed back the spices as requested. Came out perfect, silky smooth and mild. He COMPLAINED that it wasn't "chunky" like his mother's pie, was still to spicy, and had too much crust. Later whined: "I wIsH yOu'D mAkE aNoTheR pIe!" F*#k it, I let the rest of the pumpkins sit and rot.
Update: Felt a bit guilty about this one. By "rot", I meant I just left them in cold underground storage for months. Funny thing about pumpkins - the little suckers are RESILIENT. Months later, the flesh gets a bit stringy - not suitable for "chunky" pie (HA HA!), but scrape the flesh and bake it, and it makes an absolutely FINE puree. I am currently having an fantastic pumpkin cheesecake made from Chef John's recipe with pumpkin picked 7 months ago! Edit: don't forget to drain it - pumpkin is mostly water...
Only saw 2 or 3 things I wouldn't have tried!
Never laughed so hard.
I think "Home Economics" needs to be added back into the school curriculum. So many of the errors are easily avoided with a little baking education. Oh well... Everyone keep trying (and read the recipe first all the way through and then follow it exactly)
Priceless!!!
OMG - these were priceless! I'm just very happy I've loved to bake since I was a kid. That didn't stop my Mom from making Disappearing Marshamallow Brownies with confectioner sugar instead of flour though. And that happened BEFORE coronavirus! LOL!
I laughed so hard and loud, I woke my dog!
the missing link
Some people are not measuring, not enough heat in the oven or way too much. Baking is nothing like cooking. It's a science.
A lot of these look like fails/ half arsed attempts on purpose for sympathy likes.... or people making cookies with too much butter or even too low.
Y'all need to check your oven temperature vs oven setting temperature..
Yes, you can get an oven thermometer and just leave it in there, and they're not expensive.
well ,,, maybe you all need cooking lesson, or maybe need to get better cooking books or if your reading the cooking books and not understanding need to learn to read better..... well any way if your grandmother is a great cook and still around let her teach you, even your mother, if not borrow someone elses mother or grandmother to teach you .. i bet they will gladly teach you.
Most of it looks editable.
Editable?
That's when you eat it at a table, duh! 😂
I never realized so many people have a hard time baking.... I'll just be quiet over here....
Did anyone notice all the stupid bot comments? And then they disappeared?
Are parents not teaching their kids anymore?
Um, just follow the recipe? Use the right temperature, baking times right from the recipe, any questions about terms just google them (as another commentor did).
I didn't realize how many baking terms people misunderstand until I started teaching my husband to bake. If you THINK you know what it means, then you won't Google it. He thought that "preheat" was a joke because of a George Carlin bit, so he was just shoving things in the oven and then turning it on. He didn't level anything. He thought "add more flour as needed" meant you HAD to add more flour, and he thought "place 2-inches apart" was just a suggestion. And, for reasons I will never understand, he mashed the chocolate chip cookie dough with a potato masher. He said it was too hard to stir it with a spoon. When I finally stopped laughing, I asked him why he didn't use the mixer. He said he didn't see any sense in dirtying up the mixer (but it was ok to dirty up the potato masher?).
I agree, but it's the usual copy-paste from the internet just to post... No new ideas.
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It looks like any posting these days is related to quarantine. Baking mishaps also occur without quarantine...
turns out angel food cake turns into a cake golem if you put it in the nordicware ghost pan. ghostttt-5...143aea.jpg
still epic
That's hilarious!
some of you just need to make sure you: spread your cookies out on the tray, only fill cake tins/cases 3/4 of the way, Keep your designs simple, THEY ARE (hopefully) GOING TO RISE/SPREAD
Also: Chill your cookie dough before baking!
Thanks, Bunzilla. I did not know that.
What I learned today is: take a pic of everything you cook in the oven before, just in case. At least I'll have an evidence of what I tried to do :)
Qq123123, but you can't find the decency to use proper grammar when telling us about a job? Scam.
It’s a bot, they’re annoying but just downvote them and BP will get rid of the account.
*grammar (sorry)
Omg Aragorn ll Elessar, I did not even notice that! 😆 I must look pretty stupid lol
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I earned $5000 ultimate month by using operating online only for 5 to 8 hours on my computer and this was so smooth that i personally couldn’t accept as true with before working on this website......>>>https://bit.ly/2O5A9Xc
I am sitting here laughing at these while knowing that if I were to try ANY of these the results would be as bad or much, much worse ☺.
I do bake. And now I know where all of the flour and yeast went during the first week of lockdowns... "Let's do some fun family stuff! Baking! Baking is easy!" ... ... buahahahhahaha*snort*hahahaha
I really was hungry hungry hungry for sourdough bread. But I live in one of the most dangerous CV hotspots in the US. I'm not going to risk death by CV for a piece of bread. No problem! I got my sister to send me a long-forgotten 1983 recipe she wrote down watching my Grandma make her really really really good bread. She scribbled here notes on a pad as G-mom mixed everything. So I made it. I misread the amount of salt. Instead of two teaspoons, I put in two tablespoons. OOPS.... I am not enough of a cook to catch that mistake. Now I know what salt water fish taste when they sip a little drink from the ocean... It got eaten. I choked it down with a smile, and edited the recipe.
I went to a pastry making cooking camp and the recipe called for a 1/4 of a teaspoon vanilla extract. Instead my partner puts in a 1/4 CUP! That’s about 8 dollars btw
Unlike just simple cooking..baking is a science. You have to follow the measurements and the instructions to the letter. You can't just toss ingredients into a bowl and hope for the best. This is one reason I'm an excellent cook, but a lousy baker. I can throw ingredients into a dish and make a great casserole or 3 course dinner...but I can't make cookies without them turning out flat and chewy....
But I like flat chewy cookies.
Yes! Yes! Lets hear it for flat chewy cookies! I totally agree.
Baking just takes practice. With cooking, a lot of times, you can taste the dish at pivotal points and adjust spices, thickness, etc. With baking, you don't realize mistakes until it's done, or too late to make changes. I've been baking so long I can just tell when it's right... Or not right. Just keep trying, you'll get the hang of it.
Same!
This comment has been deleted.
At least they tried. I love that everyone is getting back to basics, learning things they either haven't done before, or trying to improve upon long forgotten skills. I've seen some bakers/cooks "gatekeeping" things like flour and yeast. They get angry that people are taking these things from the supermarket, when they're not sure what to do with it. I think it's great. No one is going to be perfect straight away; you might have to make glue a thousand times before you get edible pasta. I'm trying my hand at sewing again, and I'm really, really bad at it. Only one way to improve though.
Baking is not for the impatient, you need to make sure you're keeping a close eye on whatevers in your oven, otherwise you're likely to forget and burn, at least if you're a beginner. If you're not though, you get to the point you instinctively know to bake something for "X" amount of minutes. But honestly, I've been baking since childhood, and I'm 24 now, and still make mistakes, happens to all of us!
There's pics here I can't unsee. Thanks for the laughs bakers!
Baking takes practise. Pre heating is very important. Probably worth buying an oven thermometer to check it is getting to the correct temp.
Definitely get an oven thermometer. And put it in different spots in the oven periodically. My first oven was so old, the numbers were worn off on the knob. Also, it had a hot spot on the left back side. It was free, so I didn't complain, but a thermometer was VERY helpful.
I'd be in a world of hurt without mine. I have literally worn out my brand new stove in four years! Two burners get super hot with no warning, and the oven runs between 10 to 25 degrees too hot and has a hot spot in the same place as yours does! They aren't built to be used daily anymore. What I wouldn't give to have my Nan's old reliable GE right now.
I applaud all these people trying to cook at home! It's not easy and requires more talent and time than imagined. I'm 58, love to cook and I've screwed up a few new recipes since lock down. I'm on my 7th recipe for biscuits. Gee whiz, what fun!
Chill your cookie dough....
my sister (who is a pretty good baker for the most part) was making cookies and we didn't have any butter, so she used ghee (nasty i hate that stuff) and lets just say the cookies didn't turn out and the house stunk for hours... :/
Oops. It's the bit they take out of ghee (clarified butter) that you really need for cookies. It was worth a shot though, a lot of very tasty recipes are the result of "mistakes".
Ghee is the literal inverse of baking butter?
This comment has been deleted.
^^ How's that possible hahahaha!!!
🤤 or ಠಿ_ಠ
I burned chocolate. Don`t ask.
I had thought my baking was bad since I started during the quarantine but seeing this made me not loose hope, I'm still better🤣🤣
A little practice and you'll be an expert - now's the perfect time!
Great point Hans, why don’t you make a post about something else in that case? I can’t wait to see it