Cooking With Pet Fur

After reading many wonderful hubs on cooking techniques, I thought one had been totally looked over:  cooking with pet fur.  To truly understand the technique, one only has to live in a house with one or more furry friends and have one or all of them shedding at the same time.  Anyone who has pets surely knows what I’m referring to.  If you’re one of those people and you don’t want other people to know that you’re indeed one of those people, read on for techniques on cooking with pet fur in your kitchen.

Are you a forgetful housekeeper? Is your pet constantly shedding during not just one, but all seasons of the year? Is it difficult to remember the last time you swept the kitchen floor? Perhaps you have also deluded yourself into believing that Charlotte the spider is residing in the upper left hand corner of your pantry. If this sounds familiar, you’re adept at avoidance techniques. While you know that there is fur under your kitchen stove and possibly on the verge of causing a fire under your refrigerator, you’ll ignore it until you actually see the puffs of smoke curling up from the floor. It isn’t that you’ve forgotten to clean, but rather you choose not to clean. In the back of your mind you’re thinking there really is such a thing as dust bunnies – and they are your little friends.

The swat and swish technique assumes that you are only cooking for one person and no one else.  Why?  Because if you were preparing food for someone else using this method than you should be hauled away and locked up by the Department of Health.  A swatter is someone who sees pet fur floating around their kitchen and simply swats it away with their hand.  This most often happens during the cool months when the heater is on frequently.  When the heat comes on, the fur doth fly, usually right into that soup you’re cooking on the stove.  This is where the swish comes in; simply swish a slotted spoon across the top of the cooking pot and remove those pesky pet hairs.  No one will know this ever happened- it will be our little secret!

Even the cleanest cook who has pets can make a mistake, especially if a pet is involved. Sure, you can say “Holy Frijoles! How did that get in there?”- but eventually that excuse is going to wear a little thin. The trick is to keep your shock genuine by using cutesy food-related sayings (like holy frijoles), and clapping one hand across your mouth in mock-shock while using the other to grab the offending plate or bowl containing the pet fur. Trot that dish back into the kitchen and remove the offending fur. A real friend or family member will forgive your transgression, and if you’re lucky, take you out to dinner the next time. This is a win-win situation for the pet owner and the poor individual subjected to pie a la pet fur.

Before you shave or use a depilatory product on your pet, or if you can afford it, buy a hairless pet, consider the easier way out- clean your kitchen before cooking. While I’ve had some friends try and convince me that “pet hair adds flavor,” I’m just not buying it. Perhaps I will when I’m old and my eyesight has failed. I hope at that point, as I’m surrounded by 40 cats and a few dogs, that my tongue can no longer taste or identify the presence of pet fur in my food. If you’re really not up to cleaning, just cook for yourself and spare the rest of us your culinary surprises. Honest- we won’t mind; in fact, we’ll be grateful!