Photos show what happens to different foods when you make common mistakes
Rachel Askinasi
- Insider's Recipe For Success column explores what happens to different sweet and savory foods when home cooks make common mistakes in the kitchen.
- I've made 10 different dishes in multiple ways to see what can go wrong, and what mistakes actually make even more delicious versions of the original recipe.
- From desserts like chocolate-chip cookies and brownies to breakfast foods like banana bread and scrambled eggs, there are a lot of ways to make yummy treats.
After making 71 chocolate-chip cookies, I found my new favorite recipe variation.
Using the Nestlé Toll House recipe as my starting point, I made 10 different batches with 10 different mistakes.
By adding an extra egg, my cookies came out tasting like sponge cake. On the flip side, leaving eggs out completely made the cookies super salty and crumbly.
I left out most of the flour in one batch and ended up with a thin, crispy, delicious cookie. That's the only way I'll be making chocolate-chip cookies from now on.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Fourteen batches of gingerbread cookies later, I found out that some mistakes can make you think you'll chip a tooth.
Using Martha Stewart's basic gingerbread cookie recipe, I tested out 14 different mistakes.
I added extra molasses to one batch and it made a nice, soft cookie. But if you add extra brown sugar by accident, be very careful when you take a bite — it makes the cookies extremely hard.
I also found out that I am terrible at icing cookies.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
After making 72 edible brownies and one additional batch that went in the trash, I'll never forget the eggs in this recipe again.
I made nine batches of brownies by messing up the Hershey's recipe.
While I loved the pan I made using too much flour (they were both cakey and fudgey), the batch made without eggs was completely inedible. (it had no substance and tasted like sand).
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Eggs are also a game-changing ingredient in pumpkin pie.
For my first attempt at making homemade pumpkin pie, I decided to use the recipe on the Libby's pumpkin purée can.
When I forgot the eggs, my pie turned out like a drippy, runny, soup in the middle. It still tasted good, though, as did the other eight batches I messed up!
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Sugar makes all the difference when it comes to how moist or dry a banana bread turns out.
For this breakfast treat, I turned to a recipe by home cooking guru, Joanna Gaines.
It turns out that both extra sugar and too little flour both create a caramelized-like loaf of banana bread, which is delicious in my opinion.
After making a dozen loaves each with a different recipe variation, I decided I prefer the dense, dark, and moist cakes to the fluffy, light, dry cakes.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
You can turn your pancakes into thick, fluffy pillows or thin almost-crepes by adjusting the. amount of milk you use.
I learned a lot by making 14 batches of pancakes with Martha Stewart's recipe.
Adding too much milk to your mix will create a sweet, crepe-like pancake, which isn't a terrible mistake. But whatever you do, don't use baking soda instead of baking powder — your pancakes will taste horribly metallic.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
I used to make scrambled eggs on medium or high heat. But I'm sticking with the low and slow method from now on.
I made scrambled eggs 10 different ways, and they all looked completely different, especially the ones made by following Gordon Ramsay's recipe.
Some tips I turned to, like adding milk, left me with a wet mess of eggs. But adding heavy cream made them fluffier.
I also messed with the flame heat, which had the biggest impact on my eggs.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Everyone has their own way of boiling eggs, and after making 24 eggs, I learned that every second in the pot counts.
I boiled 24 eggs at different heats and for different amounts of time.
The biggest thing I learned here is that the combination of cooking method and cook time is extremely important to pay attention to when you're trying to achieve a specific cook on your egg.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Poached eggs are extremely difficult to master.
Making perfect poached eggs takes practice. There are tons of tutorials out there, but, in my opinion, you just have to try them out yourself to see which method is best for you.
I poached eight eggs and got relatively different results each time, but I learned that common tips like adding vinegar to the water, making a whirlpool, or straining the raw egg don't really make much of a difference in the finished egg.
The pan depth does make a difference in the shape of your poached egg, though.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
Bacon can take on drastically different textures depending on how you cook it.
I made 16 strips of bacon eight different ways, and even though some were better than others, I learned that it's pretty difficult to mess up bacon.
Though I was surprised by how much I liked the bacon I made in the microwave, the strips made in a dry skillet (from cold) were the most consistently cooked.
Read more about my entire experiment and how each batch turned out.
- Read more:
- 19 baking fails to make you feel better about your kitchen skills
- Gordon Ramsay stands by his $24 full English breakfast after fans criticized its price and size, and he said he'd choose it to be his last meal
- I tried the Miley Cyrus burrito Chipotle just added to its menu, and it was the best thing I've ever eaten at the chain restaurant
- I made Gordon Ramsay's iconic scrambled eggs and it's the only way I'll eat them from now on
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