Fool me once . . .

shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

There's a Thai restaurant near our house that Zac and I love. Love, love, LOVE. We go every three or four weeks. At this point we've had about half the items on the menu and we've yet to find something that isn't utterly delicious. Almost every time we go we end up ordering a side of chicken pad Thai. I'm salivating just thinking of it.

Zac and I decided that we should try our hand at cooking some tasty Thai treats at home. We spent a good deal of time in the cookbook section of a local bookstore and finally decided on a Thai cookbook which contained photos at each step of preparation. It seemed easy enough so we purchased it. We looked up a few dishes we wanted to make, pad Thai included, and assembled a list of ingredients that we needed to get. (Up until then fish sauce hadn't been a staple in our pantry.)

A couple months ago Zac and I tried making pad Thai for the first time. It turned out poorly. If the Thai restaurant by our house makes a "10", this was about a 2.25. The flavors were flat, and most importantly, the noodles were undercooked. I can't figure out how to describe what it's like eating undercooked rice noodles, but it's unpleasant. Zac and I took stock of what went wrong, what went right and decided to try again at some point.

Tonight was our second attempt. Because the texture of the noodles was the main culprit last time I resolved to (at the very least) get the noodles right this time around. I soaked them in cold water overnight, per the instructions, tossed them into the hot pan, per the instructions, heated them until they were translucent, again - instructions, and then added the sauce and let it cook. Now the instructions claim that once the sauce is in the noodles should be very close to being done. Well, I continued to cook my noodles for more than 15 minutes after adding the sauce, sampling noodles every couple of minutes or so waiting for them to soften up. No go.

Finally as I approached 20 minutes I thought, "These have to be done by now." I turned them off and dished up supper. The sauce looked better this time, though there wasn't enough for my liking. It smelled alright. I scooped up a bite and tried it.

Dang it.

If last time's batch was a 2.25, this attempt was a 3.0. (And that's only because the sauce seemed to come together a little bit better.) I'm royally ticked off. I pride myself on my cooking - or at the very least for being able to follow a recipe. Usually if I foul up a dish on the first go around I can fix it on the second attempt. That didn't happen this time around. I'm flummoxed and befuddled. And downright crabby.

I'm reluctant to give this dish a third try because at some point I'm just wasting ingredients. I looked online and some people have suggested boiling noodles before trying to add them. But I'm sure it will take me a few attempts to get the boiled noodles to the right texture. For the frustration and stress this is causing me I had might as well just order some take-out from the restaurant.

So while Zac was a trooper and ate some for supper, you'll have to excuse me, but I have to go make a bowl of corn flakes.