Earlier this week I decided to boil a can of sweetened condensed milk to make dulce de leche. It had been years since I'd made it, but how hard could it be?
I carefully placed the can into a pot of boiling water and left the room, expecting to return in a couple hours to find caramelly deliciousness. Dulce de leche is so good spread on toast or, let's be honest, eaten by the spoonful. My mouth's watering just thinking about it.
I went to clean the living room, straightening a couch cushion here and picking up a dirty dish there, not giving the pot a second thought. But just after I'd checked the time to see how long it had to go, I heard a loud BOOM from the kitchen. Did I mention I've been on crutches the past week with a knee injury? I hobbled as fast as I could to survey the damage, and I'll admit, a few choice words may have slipped from my lips on the way there.
There was dulce de leche everywhere. It looked more like ten cans worth than one. I've never seen a bigger kitchen mess, and for me, that's saying something! Here's the scene I was greeted with:
On the ceiling, on the floors,
On the cabinets and the drawers,
On the stove, the floor, the wall,
On utensils it did fall.
Never before and never since
Has a kitchen held more stuff to rinse.
This ooey gooey sticky sweet
Glommed onto things like a sugary leech.
Solemnly, I surveyed the saccharine gore,
Like a queen preparing her troops for war.
Grabbing paper towels, I turned to the pug.
"You there! You'll get the stuff on the rug."
And now, to the serious business at hand,
With Swiffer and dish rags at my command,
I carefully lowered myself to the ground,
The dulce getting all over me, I soon found
But I scrubbed until I couldn't scrub any more.
And let me tell you, now you could eat off that floor.
The moral is simple: wherever you roam,
There's no place you'll find like home, sweet, home.
