W. Curt Vincent
Editor
I thought I had long ago filed this memory into the deep, dark recesses of my memory.
Apparently not.
On Wednesday, there was a story circulating the Internet about the unveiling of an apple-pie-flavored Pepsi just in time for Thanksgiving — except the new soda wasn’t going to be made available in stores.
Instead, the Pepsi folks opened up a contest asking people to post a photo or video of their worst baking fail on TikTok or Twitter, using #pepsiapplepiechallenge. The first 15,000 entries are eligible to win.
Pepsi will select its favorites, each of whom will be sent a 2-liter bottle of Pepsi Apple Pie. The product — designed to taste and smell like an apple pie, with notes of cinnamon, crisp apples and buttery pastry crust — will come in Pepsi’s new redesigned bottles.
I like apples, love cinnamon and can hardly pass up a buttery pastry crust. But I’m not a fan of apple pie.
Perhaps this is why …
First, let me say that most guys are not bakers.
Grill masters, yes.
Efficient in the kitchen, sure.
But overlord of the oven, they typically are not. They EAT cakes, pies, cookies and the like — they don’t MAKE them.
Feeling the challenge and looking to dispel that clear and obvious fact, I decided a number of years ago to bake my own apple pie for the holidays, creating it from start to finish — including the selection of the apples, making the crust from scratch, dumping it all together and baking it to perfection.
It was a disaster.
So there I was in the kitchen, having already warned everyone within earshot to stay away until the all-clear was given, I had located everything I would need within arm’s reach.
I can follow directions, I promise. Cutting the apples went flawlessly, even though I nibbled a few pieces along the way. Preparing and creating the dough was a bit sketchy, but I got there. Within a reasonable amount of time, I was ready to assemble.
The pie crust fit into the ceramic pie thingy, the apples filled the space needed and the spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and even a drizzle of lemon juice went without fail. I then got creative by cutting the leftover crust into strips and arranged them across the pie top in a lattice configuration. Vwa-la!
Sounds like I was on my way to perfection, right?
Keep reading.
Now that my pie was completely put together, I set my cook time for 35 minutes as instructed — and proceeded to slide the pie into the microwave and pressed the “start” button.
You read correctly. MICROWAVE.
I have all kinds of excuses and a few reasons for doing that, but none of them are excusable or reasonable — something that was pointed out to me many times by my family between Thanksgiving 1999 and Christmas 2010-ish.
Anyway, that’s not the end of the story, and this is probably what Pepsi wants to know about.
As I was cleaning up my considerable mess, it didn’t take terribly long before I began to smell something … and it wasn’t a pleasant warm apple pie odor with hints of cinnamon and nutmeg. It was hard to describe, but something wasn’t right.
Then I heard it — a fairly loud pop. Maybe “explosion” would be a better way to describe it. And it came from the general direction of the microwave.
That’s when I realized I had made a very bad mistake. But I still opened the oven, just to make sure I hadn’t actually put the pie where it should be. I hadn’t.
So I stopped the microwave and went to push the latch that opened the door.
You know, there’s no way to open a microwave door slowly. When I pushed the latch, the door just flung open to reveal my pie — or what used to be a pie, now with seriously overcooked crust and violently burst apples strewn into every nook and cranny of the microwave’s innards.
Cleanup was attempted but soon evolved into something different. Within an hour I arrived back home with a new microwave AND an apple pie, which warmed nicely in the oven.
Just so the Pepsi folks know, there were photos taken — not by me. But they have since been destroyed — by me.
I’ve focused only on the turkey ever since.
W. Curt Vincent can be reached by calling 910-506-3023 or [email protected].