Jello Worms

Despite everything and the many (many, many… manymanymany, seriously MANY) times I’ve failed at kitchen stuff, I am ever-hopeful. I had visions of presenting this bowl of Jello worms to everyone at a party to a chorus of gags and ewwws.

Image from Instructables

And, really, it all started well enough. Even I can handle mixing Jello.

And when it came time to pour it in the straws, I figured I had the tutorial beat because no one had thought about using beer glasses as the straw holders. BOOM.

I mean, yeah, there were a few hitches along the way. I had gel food coloring, and I’ve never used gel food coloring before, and I had no idea how much of that you use to equate to “15 drops.” (I guessed. Big surprise, I know.)

But, really, once I poured these things and stuck them in the refrigerator to set overnight, I had high hopes. As long as no one made a mad grab for the apple cider in the middle of the night and tipped them over, all would be well.

And then I woke up the next morning and ran immediately to the kitchen, like a kid on Christmas. (What? You didn’t run immediately to the kitchen on Christmas morning?)

Once I took all the straws out of one of the glasses, I was ready to begin.

I’d read up on several ways to get the worms out of the straws and decided to try what I’d deemed the least invasive tactic first: holding the worms over hot water and just letting them “fall right out.”

Yeah.

Then I tried the rolling pin method: roll them out of the straws slowly and carefully with a rolling pin. This gave marginally better results.

I did say marginally, didn’t I?

I tried extracting them by surgically slicing the straw with a very sharp knife, but I only tried it once before I had visions of an emergency room trip without a bra on, so that didn’t last long.

I squeezed a few of them out with just my fingers. I’ve never had to help a cow give birth, but now I can imagine it, complete with slimy red substance oozing everywhere. My kitchen floor is going to be sticky for weeks.

In short, nothing worked, and after about twenty minutes of fruitless effort, I gave up and threw those fuckers away.

Sigh. Another one bites the dust. But I actually don’t feel that bad about it because the most ideal result still would have left me with a bowl full of gross-looking shit.