What will later be known as: "The Monkey Bread Mishap of 2011"

Behold—the most perfect looking AND tasting monkey bread to ever come out of an oven fire. (With the oven cleaner placed strategically behind it.) 

I'm not much of a breakfast maker. Every morning Clara gets the same thing: oatmeal. She doesn't mind. She can't talk. Occasionally if I'm in a really giving mood I'll make eggs. But this morning I got it into my head to do something extra special and make monkey bread from the Our Best Bites recipe book. My mom gave it to me for my birthday and since then I've gone nuts in the kitchen.

While said monkey bread was baking, I noticed smoke—and a good amount of it. I opened the oven door to inspect the situation and found that some of the butter/honey mixture had dripped out and was bubbling and blackening on the bottom of the oven. I hate when that happens because it's a big pain to clean up—but, no biggie. I pulled out the bread and placed it on a cookie sheet to catch anything more that might leak. Problem solved. By then the smoke had made its way to the fire alarm, but I just pulled the old tried-and-true stunt we all learn in college of waving a rag in front of it, and it quieted right down. All was well for another five minutes—when the fire alarm sounded off again. I grabbed my rag and was ready for a good rag-waving, but got side tracked when I noticed flames inside my oven.

For the next 30 seconds, I hopped from foot to foot doing the ohcrapwhatdoIdowhatdoIdo dance. And then I thought it prudent to turn off my oven.

Let me explain the nature of these flames. They weren't huge. It was not a huge catastrophe, but they were just large enough that I did feel a very strong sense of urgency to make the flames go away.

We don't have a fire extinguisher, but I wondered about baking soda. But I couldn't remember if that would make things worse. If there's one thing I'm not—that would be a chemist. I did take chemistry back in 10th grade—but I believe my friend Samantha and I spent more time working on finding rhyming words for lyrics to our none-hit-wonder "I Hate My 3rd Period Class," rather than really paying attention.

So I hurried to my lap top to look up the phone number to the fire department. I figured incidents like this might be semi common, and someone there could probably direct how to put out a smallish oven fire. The lap top wasn't turned on! It would take years to load up! I hurried to our other computer. All the while Clara watched with baited breath from her Bumbo, having no idea why her mom was hopping around so much.

Oh, and at some point during all of this, I thought: Save the monkey bread!

I called the fire department. It rang and rang and rang and rang and rang. I called a different department. It rang and rang and rang and rang and rang. And rang some more. I hung up completely puzzled and disillusioned with these emergency rescuers that weren't even answering their phone. I looked at the flames through my oven window, and then decided that perhaps the police might be my next best bet.

Season: "Hi, I can't seem to get through at the fire department, so maybe you can help me? My oven started fire and I was hoping someone could tell me how to put it out?"

"Your oven's on fire right now?"

"Yes. Well, the inside."

"Okay ma'am, I'll need to notify the fire department and get someone out to you. Let me just get some information really quickly."

"Oh no, that's not necessary. It's really not that big of a deal. It's a pretty little fire, but I'm not really sure how I should put it out."

The officer scoff-chuckled: "Well, it could become a big deal, so I better send someone out." (I could sense his mocking tone.)

"Are you sure? I mean, if I could only talk to someone who might know about household remedies. It's down to like only one or two flames now."

Then the fire alarm went off—again.

Officer: "Is that your fire alarm, ma'am?"

Glaring at my fire alarm for its impeccable timing, I answered: "Uh, yes. There's—a little bit of smoke." I waved my towel at it furiously.

"I better send someone out."

I hung my head in shame and conceded: "This is really embarrassing."

"No need to be embarrassed, ma'am."

Not even 10 seconds after hanging up, the fire put itself out.

I quickly called Tom, who was on his way home from work, to let him know that firefighters were coming to put out a fire that had already put itself out. Then, as I was debating on calling the police station right back to tell them this newest turn of events, I received another phone call from Utah's finest: "Hi Season, I'm going to need you and everyone inside to evacuate the building and wait for us to get there."

"OH—well, listen. The fire just put itself out. So I really don't think you need to even come out."

"Well we can't call off the firefighters until someone at least comes to take a look."

"Okay, but do I really need to evacuate my home?" I felt like an insolent, small child.

"Yes, it's protocol."

That's when Tom walked in and I said, "We need to evacuate—go, go, GO!" (That last part? Not true. But it makes the story so much better, don't you agree?)

A police officer soon showed up, toting a fire extinguisher. Then we could hear the fire truck sirens blaring, and we saw the monstrous ol' fire truck come barreling into our complex, lights flashing, whistles blowing—and seriously, blogdom: We've arrived at the specific part of the story where I really felt like I wanted to die.

Two firefighters ushered in and they and the police officer poked around by the oven for a total of about 45 seconds before deeming the place safe and sound. But I did hear one of them say, "Ooh, monkey bread!"

They hadn't even left the complex before my phone started ringing. It was my neighbor from the stairwell over and also a member of our ward. She's a shouter by nature.

"DO YOU KNOW WHAT'S HAPPENING???? IS IT MERINA??" (Merina is my crazy neighbor that you might recall me mentioning once or twice...)

"Oh....no—it was us. My oven caught fire. We're fine!"

Still in a frenzy, "BECAUSE I ASKED THE FIREMEN BUT THEY WOULDN'T TELL ME AND I'M JUST SO WORRIED SOMETHING'S—(pause)—Oh. It was YOU? YOUR OVEN BURNED DOWN??"

"No, no. Kind of a funny story, actually. Just a small fire from some butter dripping down to the bottom."

Laughter ensues: "I WAS SO WORRIED IT WAS MERINA! BUT IT WAS JUST A FIRE YOU ACCIDENTALLY STARTED BECAUSE YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO COOK!" (More hearty laughter.)

I shook my head wondering how long it would be before this story spreads through the whole neighborhood and ward. In a half-hearted attempt to redeem myself, I said: "Well actually, the monkey bread turned out perfect."

She was laughing too hard to care.

But—it did turn out perfect. And as all happy endings go, Clara and I have been chowing down all day.

***THE END***