Almost burned my house down drying herbs in the oven

I tried drying basil from my garden at 170 degrees for 2 hours, thinking that was low enough. Came back to smoke pouring out and the leaves were black, not green. The smoke detector went off and I had to air out the whole kitchen for a day. Anyone else ruin a batch of something by cooking it too slow?

2 comments

2 Comments

lane.joel3d ago

Used to think you could just throw herbs in the oven at any low temp and they'd be fine, but that basil taught me a lesson real quick. Had some mint I tried at 200 for an hour, thinking "what's the worst that could happen?" Came back to find the whole kitchen smelling like burnt toothpaste and the leaves were crispy little ash flakes. Now I just air dry everything on a paper towel in the corner, takes longer but at least I'm not setting off alarms.

taylorm893d ago

Ha, oh man, burnt toothpaste smell sounds way worse than what I dealt with. I thought I was being smart by setting a timer but got distracted watching a show, and ended up with rosemary that looked more like charcoal than anything edible. My smoke detector is basically my cooking timer at this point, guess I should just invest in a dehydrator like a normal person instead of testing my home's fire safety every season.