The Mandolin Slicer and my Pinkie

We have been trying to rid our house of packaged foods. We are buying more foods in their original state and making meals out of them. One of the foods I thought would be easy to do on my own was the most loved french fry! I found a great recipe online and went to work.

I purchased a french fry cutter much like an apple cutter. Unfortunately, it didn't work out as well as the apple cutter. I could not get the cutter down more than 1/4 way through the potato. So, my first batch I had to cut the potatoes by hand. It wasn't too bad, but we like french fries and I don't have time to cut them by had every time we wanted them. So, onto plan B.

Plan B - purchase a mandolin slicer. This seemed like a great investment because I can use to to slice tons of fruits and veggies! It comes with many attachments to cut with! So, the next time we decided to have french fries I took out the slicer and began to cut. I noticed that these french fries sliced a lot thinner than I would have liked, but hey, I was baking them so I would just have to watch carefully before they got crunchy. The following picture in exhibit A....the slicer!

I got the french fries soaking in a salt water solution---makes them yummier - and decided to cut up some tomato and cucumber for everyone to eat with dinner. Sliced up the tomato in seconds and was fabulous. Got the cucumber peeled and realized it was too big to handle right with the veggie holder so I just held it with my hand. BIG MISTAKE!

After I got halfway through, I should have switched to using the holder but got carried away. Before I knew it there was blood....lots of it. I sliced almost the whole length of my pinkie. It didn't even hurt at first! Ran it under water, grabbed paper towels and tried to stop the bleeding. I got myself good. Took almost an hour till I could attempt to use a band aid. After several days of changing band aids, using bacitracin and cleaning it out, it started to look better. After 3 weeks I was able to take the band aids off for good. This is what my pinkie looks like now:

Except for a small section near the top, my pinkie feels fine. The little part near the top is still a little sore. It has been another week and it looks even better and doesn't hurt nearly as bad. Needless to say, I DO NOT use the slicer without the holder anymore......and you shouldn't either!

After all that, the french fries cut with the slicer were just too thin. I love the way it slices other veggies and fruits, but I will be cutting by hand from now on!