Want a laugh at my expense?

I didn't make it to the grocery store yesterday morning. (No, that's not the funny part.) I avoid taking all 3 children with me like the plague, so I didn't attempt an after school trip. So that meant I had to scrape the bottom of the barrel when it came to dinner last night.

Some friends of ours had moved and gave us some of the food left in their kitchen. I had these 2 cans of salmon sitting there that I had yet to do anything with. I'd never actually used canned salmon, I usually consume my salmon in the fillet form. I could only think of one thing to make with it, salmon patties, and I knew C might not be a huge fan. I have eaten canned salmon before, but only that which someone else has completely prepared...out of my line of vision. But I didn't have enough of anything else to make an entire meal out of, so I figured what the heck.

So I search around to find a way to make them without eggs because I was out. Find a way using mayo. Sounds gross, but I'm already being adventurous here, so lets just go all the way. All the recipes say to debone the salmon. I vaguely wondered how that would work, was slightly grossed out by the fact that there were bones in the can, and then figured it must not be too big of a deal since all the recipes said to take out the bones.

Then I opened the can. Please tell me that this is a secret joke that the world plays on unsuspecting canned salmon virgins, because I'm fairly certain I have ever seen anything THAT disgusting in my life. I just about threw it away and called C begging him to bring home food. But we had eaten out more times than we should have over the weekend and I was determined not to be a total wuss. I picked my way through the can discarding as much of the bones and skin as I could, along with any part of it that was just too gross looking for me to even imagine eating. I think I probably ended up with half the can in my bowl and the other half I threw away. It was so gross I couldn't even bring myself to feed it to the dog.

As a side note: I never used to eat chicken off a bone because to me that was super disgusting. I tend to like my food to NOT look anything like it did before it died. I have gotten better about it and will eat some off a bone, but the idea still skeeves me out quite a bit. This canned salmon...SO much worse, so, so, so, SO much worse.

Well crap, half a can of salmon is not going to feed my family, so I was going to HAVE to open the other can. I figured that there was just no way any company would sell canned salmon if it was really THAT difficult and THAT gross, there had to be a better way. So I set about to Google-fu myself something, anything, that might salvage the meal.

And lo and behold...you don't have to take the bones out! They are very soft and a good source of calcium, woo hoo!! Ok, that's great and all, but that still leaves the skin and the backbone part for me to dig out. Somehow the second can didn't look *quite* so disgusting as the first, but that really isn't saying much. Overall that can went much more smoothly and I ended up with less than half in the trash.

At least they didn't turn out horribly. They weren't great or anything, my kids liked them, and I guess that's all that matters. I told C he might want to pick himself up something to eat on the way home, just in case. I think they may have been better with an egg, not that I will test that hypothesis because you'd have to pay me a lot of money to open another can of salmon. And you'll never again hear me complain about the cost of fresh salmon because it is most definitely worth it!