No, Not A Slime Mold

Day 265: No, it's not a slime mold, although when I first saw it in the grass outside my kitchen door, that's what I thought. Nor is it an artistic image, but you'd probably figured that out all by yourself. Rather, it's an opportunity for me to educate you in one of the slickest kitchen hacks I've ever used: how to remove scorch from the bottom of a pan.

Y'see, I had put the hummer food on to boil and then stepped outside, intending to come right back in the house. However, my eye was caught by some weeds which wanted whacking, so I got the weed-whacker out of the garage and went to work. I finished up in about fifteen minutes, during which time I completely forgot about the hummer food boiling away on the stove. By the time I got back inside, the kitchen was full of smoke and a charred mass of sugar was nearing the point of combustion on the stove. I ran the pan outside and threw cold water in it, averting a major crisis. But a smaller one became apparent: how was I going to save my good two-quart saucepan? I let it rest for about an hour, then poured out the residue which, as you might guess, is what this image shows. There was still a quarter inch of blackened, hard sugar syrup stuck to the bottom of the pan.

I'd saved another pan, one I'd burned milk in, by using a trick I learned from YouTube. I boiled white vinegar in it, straight, and let it set for 24 hours. I'd been able to remove the scorched milk with very little scraping, and a scouring pad took care of the rest. But this was sugar. Would the same trick work? The answer is YES, although it took a couple of treatments, probably due to the thickness of the scorch layer. Each time I boiled the vinegar, I was able to scrape off a little more using a spoon so as not to gouge the pan. Then I strained the vinegar through a coffee filter and re-boiled it. I think I repeated the process three times before I'd gotten all the scorched sugar cleaned out. So no, this is not a slime mold. It's a Scorch Monster, vanquished by vinegar, hurrah.