Frrrrench Kiss

By a show of hands - how many of you know about the mustard on a burn home remedy? Last Christmas we had a small dinner party with my parents and brother's family over here. And I was making a sugar concoction I found in Barefoot Contessa's cookbook - it involves melting sugar to a nice amber-brown in order to pour it over a little wheel of brie. And by either mistake or on purpose, my finger found its way into the molten lava sugar syrup and I mean... immediate blistering went on... and yelping.

My dad's wife [I have no problem calling her my step-mom, only that I'm 30 and this is a recent addition to our family - and - I might as well be calling my own mom by her first name at my age]... anyway, she told me to put yellow mustard on it. So, I did because I'm truly pretty gullible, but she was serious, and it worked - immediately. I blobbed it on and eventually had to take it off to resume use of the hand, but I'm not sure all that much is needed. Last night I reached into the shade of a lamp to turn it off and burned my arm on the bulb. I put just a light layer of mustard on it and it felt better right away - and I was able to get in bed without smelling like a fresh, steamy hot dog.

I've honestly tried it on a sunburn. That didn't work.