Birthday fun time

The Fried Strawberry Pies started out well enough.

And then...

DISASTER STRUCK!

 As with any good story, let's start at the very beginning.

I had really great intentions of making this delicious recipe for Eric's birthday.

So I mashed up the strawberries.

Put them in a saucepan and added sugar and cornstarch.

Heat and stir...

As the combination cooled in the saucepan, I cut circles out of the pie dough.

Once the strawberry jam like deliciousness was completely cooled, I spooned a little bit into the center of each dough circle.

Dab a little bit of water around the edge of each circle, fold it over and then pinch down the edges with a fork.

Freeze the batch of pastries for at least an hour.

Once they are done freezing, pour vegetable oil into a deep pan and heat up to 350F.

This is where things went TERRIBLY wrong.

Smoke alarms went off. 

Children cried,

Dogs barked.

...

Okay. So it wasn't THAT terrible (although the smoke alarms did go off).

While the oil was heating up, I was trying to get the old (and apparently, broken) electronic thermometer to work.  I lost track of time.  It wasn't until the smoke alarms went off that I realized the oil might be hot enough and might have reached the 350F.

TO BE FAIR, there wasn't any real visible smoke...yet.

Anyways...

I returned to the stove and put the first pastry into the oil.

Voldemort appeared and ruined everything.

Alright so Voldemort didn't appear.

But he may as well have with how crappy this turned out.

See that blacked ball above?

That would be one of my beautiful pastries after I placed it in the oil.

It IMMEDIATELY turned that color after being placed in the oil.

Sidenote: This was the point when the smoke started to appear in the apartment.

I quickly scooped the pastry out of the oil and placed it on the paper towels.

...

And that's when I noticed something terrible.

My slotted spoon.

MY SLOTTED SPOON!?!?!

Completely ruined.

Those stringy bits?

That would be melted spoon that dripped.

And it's really hard to tell in the pictures but that side of the spoon is a little flattened out.

Insert sad face.

Another sidenote: I need emoticons on here.

Mi marido had to put the saucepan outside because the smoke alarms went off a second time.

But never fear.

I was able to able to save the day a little bit.

I decided to bake the pastries.

And it worked!

That's powdered sugar on them.

I need to get a shaker for the powdered sugar...hmm...

So there you have it.  It's a fairy tale about pastries.  

Started off nice and sweet, then a villain (hot oil) came in and ruined everything.

Later to be saved the day and live happily ever after.

And before I bid you adieu, here is Eric's birthday present that I made for him.

Adieu!