Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Frying Pan

FRYING PAN, n. One part of the penal apparatus employed in that punitive institution, a woman's kitchen. The frying-pan was invented by Calvin, and by him used in cooking span-long infants that had died without baptism; and observing one day the horrible torment of a tramp who had incautiously pulled a fried babe from the waste-dump and devoured it, it occurred to the great divine to rob death of its terrors by introducing the frying-pan into every household in Geneva. Thence it spread to all corners of the world, and has been of invaluable assistance in the propagation of his sombre faith. The following lines (said to be from the pen of his Grace Bishop Potter) seem to imply that the usefulness of this utensil is not limited to this world; but as the consequences of its employment in this life reach over into the life to come, so also itself may be found on the other side, rewarding its devotees:
Old Nick was summoned to the skies.
Said Peter: "Your intentions
Are good, but you lack enterprise
Concerning new inventions.

"Now, broiling in an ancient plan
Of torment, but I hear it
Reported that the frying-pan
Sears best the wicked spirit.

"Go get one — fill it up with fat —
Fry sinners brown and good in't."
"I know a trick worth two o' that,"
Said Nick — "I'll cook their food in't."
2007 Update: A cast iron critic of pot and kettle.

34 comments:

Omnipotent Poobah said...

frying pan - A mythical creature - half man, half goat - who comes to your house on Easter morning and fries chocolate eggs.

Did I just mix metaphors here?

Hobbes said...

Stage before the fire.
I think I'm first.

Hobbes said...

Sorry, Poobah. I yield.

Anonymous said...

Frying Pan: The last thing that went through the unfaithful husband's head.

Anonymous said...

ah, so it's OUT of the fire, and in to the frying pan, eh Doug? good to know...

Anonymous said...

Doug did you define your inner self?

Great self definition

Anonymous said...

frying pan formerly known as "skillet"

The original skillets were cast iron, long handled and 20" in diameter. Few people know this, but the first skillet was designed as a weapon. In fact, that's how it came to be called skillet. Abner chase, the inventor of the skillet) and his wife, Edith, used to run their yard chasing chickens while brandishing their cast iron clubs and yelling, "Let's kill it! Let's kill it." Because of Edith's horrid lisp, all the neighbors heard was skillet.

The skillet came to be used as a cooking instrument accidently. Edith cleaned the chicken she'd beaned, then carried it into the house open the skillet, which she placed near the fire before going off to clean herself up. When she returned, the dinner was half-baked -- rather like this story.

Ariel the Thief said...

frying pan: I like your chick hot

Anonymous said...

Frying Pan: The vessel used to create most of the fantastically delicious yet incredibly unhealthful delicacies of my youth.

TLP said...

Frying pan: rather like a flying saucer. Or not.

I like Poobah's.

Minka said...

not first...

oh, hit me over the head with it already!

Anonymous said...

is "frying Pan" what happens once you make it through the Labyrinth?

Anonymous said...

FRYING PAN, n. comp.. To an Asian person struggling with English, a volatile object. Especially during an argument.

It flies through the air with the greatest of ease ...

Hey. it's still just the crack of dawn in the central Pacific. Do you realize this is the last place on earth to see today? A few miles to the west, it's already this time tomorrow. No wonder there's this lurking sense of being behind the time ...

Kyahgirl said...

well knock me over with a frying pan! I don't think I've ever seen Omnipotent Poobah in first place! Well done :-)

its ok Minka, we'll give you a couple days to get back to form.

Jamie Dawn said...

That beginning "penal apparatus" part got me all discombobulated. My idea of "penal apparatus" had nothing to do with a woman's kitchen, her bedroom maybe, but not her kitchen.

Frying Pan:
The people here pronounce it, Fryin' Pay-an.
It is a MUST HAVE if you live in the south, and you must also have a deep fryer.

Fat is our main staple. :)

I saw a mother grocery shopping with her toddler son.
As they entered the produce section he said,
"What are all these things?"

Like I said. FAT is the main staple here.

Anonymous said...

Frying pan???

I'm unfamiliar with this word. Ooooh it has to do with cooking? Pffft.

Mutha said...

I have my mother's old cast iron job and it cooks like a dream. No fried chicken in this house though -- I am told it is what the cast iron pan lives to do.

Doug The Una said...

Poobah, how about a battered lecher?

Right on, Weirsdo!

Al, I bet the image of his mistress was, even as the pan crushed his cortex.

Take notes, Neva.

Haha, Pia. I just might have.

Quill, the grown-ups in Idaho want everyone dead, don't they? I enjoyed the story.

Ariel, you have great Karma.

Darn tootin', Joel, and my adulthood.

TLP, but without the probes.

Minka, the sun will rise tomorrow, and there will still be eggs to fry.

Puppybrose, only with heating pipes.

Amoeba, that's the kind of joke you make back east.

Kyah, you know perfectly well I only have one frying pan. Who gets it?

Wayall, JD, them's fried zucchini, fried taters and fried apples when they first come off the farm.

Jenna, it's like a cast iron bath tub for chicken wings.

Mutha, that's like asking Picasso to marry.

Ariel the Thief said...

Doug, I go nowhere without her! she doesn't let me do.

Kyahgirl said...

heh heh actonbell...that would be the dish running away with the spoon (you know after seeing the cow jump over the moon and all that )

Mutha said...

Doug: Heaven forbid! He's dead!

TLP said...

kyahgirl: we taught sick and twisted nursery rhymes at our dinner table. (The kids turned out okay anyway. Where oh where did we go wrong?)

You should never wash a cast iron frying pan with any kind of soap you know. It ruins them. A fuss-butt like me couldn't handle that little factoid, so I ruined every cast iron pan I ever touched.

bghogbgr: big hog blogger

Doug The Una said...

Actonbell. miscegenation in a nursery rhyme? Heaven forfend!

Karma is nothing if not sticky, Ariel.

Kyah, in your version I bet they got stuck together from frost.

And yet, Mutha, I think his last marriage wasn't so different from that.

TLP, I'm so happy to have a housekeeping advantage. No soap, boil away the washwater and then oil it before putting it away. We bachelors may not polish the silver or vacuum the floor or pick up our socks or bathe but, by golly, my cast iron pans have all been things of beauty. It works the same for woks if you're gay.

Anonymous said...

Frying Pan: leverage

Alana said...

A launch pad to the fire.

mireille said...

*snicker* JD used the word penal And Doug, it's Le Creuset. xoxo

tsduff said...

My cast iron skillet gives me my daily iron quotient.

Minka said...

frying Pan...revolution in Neverland!

TLP said...

Is that Penal Pan, Minka?

I Dive At Night said...

Frying pan: A good weapon to have in a fist fight. A bad choice of weapons for a gun fight.

I thought it was okay to use dish soap provided you immediately dry the pan and then oil it. No?

Doug, I hope you aren't implying that cooking with a wok makes a person gay. Of course the wok itself is gay. Just like all egg beaters are lesbian. But that shouldn't stop you from cooking with it.

Doug The Una said...

Yes, Neva, after the marital custom.

Squaregirl, we're gonna have to teach you to sautée. Besides, the butter is good for your skin.

Merci, Mireille. Je suis joyeux, plus ou moin, a accuerder un peu francais.

Terry, and mine gives me my expressions.

Hahaha, Minka. I think your vacation made you more sinister, somehow.

Doesn't matter, TLP. He never grew up.

Morgan, there's a lot of truth in your definition. I imply much and mean little. Good to know about the whisks, though. I'm glad I have two.

Minka said...

Doug, so it does meet your approval then?

Doug The Una said...

The Ice Queen as snowghoul? You betcha. I'm strangely proud.

Cie Cheesemeister said...

What I fell out of into the fire and burned my bacon!