COOKING beginners, take heart.

Life may seem like a never-ending chain of failed recipes, but it is ok. Really.

We food writers would have the world believe that we were born with the proverbial silver ladle in our mouths!

But the fact is: we have all had our kitchen disasters.

And I am not talking about genuine mistakes like over-salting and burning dishes.

I am talking about legendary disasters that will haunt you to the grave!

Here's a funny (!) incident that happened to me:

I had a brilliant idea. I decided to make Chili con Carne, a spicey, stew-like dish.

For this, I used South African dried meat called Biltong.

All I did was substitute the beans with chickpeas, eliminate the wine and use Biltong instead of meat.

I never realised it all would clash in taste.

Result: The dish was summarily flushed down the loo.

Then came the disasters of the early married years, when I went from cooking occasionally for a  family of 20 to cooking daily for 2.

There was the week of the Purple Pasta.

Lesson learnt: NEVER EVER add red cabbage to anything unless you want purple results! 

Photograph: Stock Xchange

Photographs are for representative purposes only.