Kitchen oughies and boo boos

Okay maybe it's not the greatest topic but I'm sure there's a story or two. I'll let someone else start it because I'm too embarrassed to start it, but if we get enough entries I'll add to it. What injuries have you gotten by being in a kitchen. From simple cuts to amputations, hey not pleasant but a part of the job! Perhaps we could get Tarantino to do a movie about us if we get enough good stories!

[cape chef]

They just sowed my right eye back on!! man I hate the way frog legs splatter,That darn brasclette of veal got the best of my wrist when my sous chef bumped into me while I was removing the breast flap,3&1 ointment really helps when you fall head first in the henny penny, also thank god for steel toed shoes I keep my knifes very sharp and 9 toes are better then 8 but I can walk better now! I thought about having my eyebrows waxed but a little flambe does the trick
For real I have been pretty lucky, and I was just fooling around. Although I have seen some dooooozies
cc

[This message has been edited by cape chef (edited 11-27-2000).]

[Isa]

Funny thing Chrose, this weekend I was thinking about starting a topic on a simmilar subject. See I burned myself with sugar, 311°F, and was wondering what was everyone's favourite method for burn treatment. I ended up spending the rest of the day with my finger on ice.

A number of years ago I was making brownies. Butter was frozen hard solid. Try to cut a chunk and ended up cutting the tip of my finger off, about half the nail. Funny thing is at first I thought it was just a regular cut until I saw the tip of finger in the pan. That's when I kind of panic, couldn't stop the bleeding. A trip to ER and my finger was back in place.

OMG
At first I thought it might be an interesting topic and then I started to have second thoughts that you might think I was a little odder than I actually am, but then I read Sisi's post and cringed at the thought. But what the **** here goes. Trimmed a finger cutting stale bagels into croutons and within the week cut off part of my third fingertip doing the same thing. This was before I was trained and learned knife skills. A fresh clam blew in the deep fryer and shot a piece of boiling clam body into nmy left eye. Usual burns and cuts afterwards for awhile, then a nice second degree burn around my left wrist from a braiser full of oil and an armful of something! Let's see, the bookkeeper came into the kitchen, knocked my chef knife off the table and it stuck into my second toe, boinggg....... sneakers in the kitchen...bad move! Roto Rooter left the cover off of the grease trap as I was walking towards the dishwasher looking not at the floor! Nice gash on my shin bathed in sewage, that was a good one. We used to use an aluminum tenderizer and an old knife to hammer thru the wheels of parm. Turns out that rice size pieces of aluminum make nice projectiles that can embed themselves into your knuckle not allowing you to straighten it. I worked in one rest. that was an old converted house, and the prep kitchen was downstairs. Carrying a sheet pan of spices downstairs after service I slipped on the second stair and bounced all the way down getting a facefull of chili powder, that was fun also. A heel spur from standing, carpal tunnel in 2 wrists, bursitis in my shoulder (I also ran the decorating line in a dessert factory)and perhaps last but certainly not least after doing a 20 hour shift catering for Clintons first inaugeration with 18, 17 & 15 hour days previously prepping for it I came in the next morning and spent an 90 minutes in the freezer stacking bags of ice that came back from the parties I got a blood clot in my heart and was out for 9 weeks, and like an idiot I was right back at it. The insurance companies doctor said that I was Clintons first casualty! So now I sit behind a computer and also deal with chocolate, it's a lot more relaxing. I guess I just want to know that I'm not alone. Just wait till I tell you one day about Brad one of my cooks.......

[This message has been edited by chrose (edited 11-27-2000).]

[Isa]

Chrose,

Please tell me all this happened to you over a great number of years and not in the last two or three.

All your injuries made me think of this guy in my pain management group. He used to be a butcher. He got seriously injured when a carcass of beef fell onto him. When I first heard his story, I couldn't help but laugh and I was trying so hard not to but it was just too funny imagining the poor guy caught under the beef. In any case the guy is still unable to work because of back problem.


Sisi

[cape chef]

Chrose< You make me cringe.........My name is Brad
cc

[cookM]

Disgusting. I winced as I read the stories. Some bad ones (but not to me, thank God): someone reached in the bowl while the Hobart was going and broke her arm; someone was crawling up the shelves in the walk-in trying to get at something way up high and stepped into a bucket of hot stock. I won't talk to people anymore when I am on the slicer cause once I cut my hand cause I wasn't paying attention. Gross topic!

[Mezzaluna]

Oy, vey! I cut myself pretty badly on a broken Corelle dish, but you guys take the cake. I once cut a chicken leg from the thigh, using my right middle finger as the cutting board- only took three stitches, and I found out I could drive my stick shift to the ER with only my left hand... Burn ointment: don't laugh, but Preparation H works great! There used to be a burn ointment called Sperti's ointment. We figured out it contained the same ingredients as PH. Try it- not bad, although it doesn't stop the pain, it will prevent blisters and scars. My mom had a gas oven whoosh at her (pilot wasn't lit, but a spark got it going when she opened the door)- she immediately slathered her face with PH and (sounds ugly, yes?), except for the spot she missed under her nose, there was no sign of the burn at all the next morning.

[Nick.Shu]

suchn such, the most annoying cut was, when i went to put down a fish filleting knife (wearing polyprop gloves) and it hit the edge of the cutting board and i slid my index all the way up the blade (25cm blade).

The very worst injury was: after a sat nite service, i had to clean down, clean up and then move the entire contents of a kitchen down the road about 8-10 down the road. Halfway through the move, my back went "bang!". 80 hrs that week, (post injury) and i was fine (i hope - lower back injuries have a habit of reoccuring).

Im so sick of injuring myself for a employer, cant i do it as a sub contractor?

[Nick.Shu]

well, put it this way, a friend of mine has actually had to have microsurgery because, he leant against a window, and his arm went through. Unfortunately, outside was a ski resort and this made the window very brittle.

PS huh

[momoreg]

Back when I was apprenticing, I worked in a big Hilton, with a 120 qt. steam kettle. I was whisking my pastry cream with a giant steel whisk, and bludgeoned myself in the nose really bad. My nose has not been straight since. Maybe a month later, I was turning towards the walk-in, and not realizing that the door was open, walked right into the 2" narrow part of the door, nose first. Talk about black eyes! 4 years ago, in December, I was working consecutive 20 hour days (much like what I'll be facing this week), and when I came home, I made a boiling hot cup of tea. As I was walking upstairs with it, I missed a stem, and spilled the tea ALL OVER MY CHEST! I'm a woman, okay?

[momoreg]

JUst proofread my post:

Missed a STEP. That's what I meant to write.

Can I get life insurance on all you guys?

Other than the normal home-kitchen cuts, gashes and burns, most of my injuries have taken place cooking at living history sites. Keeping in mind that we did all the cooking in situ, as it were, it can be fairly hazardous! I was slicing a loaf of bread, was distracted for a moment and cut about an inch-long flap down to the bone down the side of my index finger. We were at Yorktown, VA, which is close to the same hospital that services Williamsburg. There I am with blood spewing everywhere, and the woman at the reception desk is sitting there, calmly chewing her gum. She looks at me, my funky 18th century clothing, and asks "did you do this at work?" It just struck me as funny - where else but W'burg could someone ask you a question like that in this situation? Then, on the next gurney over, there was a little girl about 5 or 6 years old who had done a flying Walenda on her bike. She was crying and upset, so they asked me to amuse her (once again, the W'burg mindset). What could I do, other than that? Then there was the time I dropped a 3-foot long log end-first onto my foot, crushing a few bones in the process. Five years later, out-patient surgery to have the nerve-mass that had formed between the bones removed. In the spirit of safety (and authenticity), I was always adamant that anyone in close proximity to the cooking fire was in natural textiles, which burn rather than melt. There was a woman in Yorktown in '78 who was dressed in man-made fibers; her clothing caught fire and she wound up in the hospital with severe burns, and emergency room staff picking melted globs of clothing out of her burns. That made quite an impression on me. The hem of my clothing did catch fire at one event, but fortunately there was snow on the ground and a fast sit took care of it.

[shroomgirl]

Umpteen years ago I wore shorts in the kitchen and burned my very upper thigh in back on a cranked up oven (did not go to the ER)
Spilt boiling French onion soup down the front of me....OUCH>>>>>those heavy stock pots....loads of work down the drain.

2 degree burns on my hands and wrists...working with my hand in icewater...they have cool burn bandages now that really work.

HMMMM sliced part of hand between my thumb adn forefinger...2 layers of stitches, I actually waited 5 hours to decide whether to see if they'd stitch that area. Grapefruit knifes are NASTY!!!

Ankle twist, knee twists etc....mostly hunting shrooms but it's rough cooking with inguries. Thank goodness my bro is a chiropractor with 3 massueses and a sister rate.

CHILLS CHILLS CHILLS CHILLS CHILLS CHILLS
as I read, more CHILLS!