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tip of index finger immersion blender.

Apparently if more than 80% of your finger tip is detached you can't have stitches. Two years late I still have no feeling in my fingertip but it healed quite nicely and the scar is barely visible.

Cheese grater, aka hand grater.

I have a bunch of scars from the cord of my oven thermometer, too. But nothing on the magnitude of your story - good God!

taking the food processor blades out of my grandmother's dishwasher when i was 11 years old and she was calling from the other room telling me not to do it because it's dangerous and i'll cut myself.

so much blood!! jeez louise!

Flashback to age five, hovering near my mother as she chopped vegetables at the kitchen counter - I reached my hand up blindly over the counter to grab a carrot, she didn't see me, and - ta da! - I still have the slightly bent middle finger and funky scars to prove it. My mom cried, I cried, my dad patched me up with some Neosporin and twenty years later, I can STILL invoke the "You Almost Chopped My Fingers Off, Mom" guilttrip when ever I need it.

Sliced tip of ring finger while slicing tomatoes on a mandoline. It was a tiny injury, but it involved a tremendous amount of blood...

Fortunately, I had finished most of the tomatoes and had already put them in a container before I sliced my finger, so I only had to throw away that last tomato.

I've sliced and diced myself many times, but none were emergency room-worthy...lately I've been having fun with the oven (forgetting to put on an oven mitt, potholder slipping when pulling the pan out, hitting one of the racks with my arm, et cetera) and have four relatively fresh scars dotted down my right arm as well as on my hand.

I consider them proof that I cook (and keep cooking, even with a burn searing that little webbing between my thumb and forefinger -- that was a fun one) , and I'm sort of proud of them =)

Sometimes drinking and cooking are a bad combination.

Recipe for disaster:
A very sharp lovely knife
strong sangria
ingredients for homemade salsa and guacamole

Luckily I'd had enough to drink that it didn't hurt much until the next day when I realized my finger probably needed stiches. It healed fine and there's not really a scar. Lesson learned? Yep.

I'm always afraid I'll grab a hot handle, too! Luckily, aside from minor cuts, burns, and a quick dip into some hot frying oil, I've never injured myself in the kitchen.

When I was a kid, I used to hold bagels in my hand while slicing them. I stopped doing that after I accidentally sliced a little too far one day. Luckily, it wasn't serious, but it was stupid. I also had a glass break on me while pushing it into our freezer's ice dispenser.

yikes you people have some kitchen horror stories. the worst i've ever done is knick myself or burn the top of my hand reaching into an oven after a glass too many of wine.

when she was very young my sister attempted to open a package of cadbury mini eggs with a steak knife. got herself in the palm just under her index finger. 4 stitches.

oh, and my mother touched the entire bottom of a frying pan being used to make some dish for french cafe in 7th grade. thaaaaaaaat was a fun evening..

i sliced my ring finger open cleaning knives after cutting bagels for a meeting - six fun stitches there. otherwise, most of my kitchen injuries were from my time as a grill cook - french fry grease in the eye, anyone? i used to have many frybasket-shaped burns when i worked that job.

Steam burn on my arm when taking the lid off a roasting pan. The steam rolled past the oven mit to exposed skin and gave me a nasty one.

Thank goodness for whatever cream it was the clinic prescribed to take the pain away. I probably wouldn't have slept for days, otherwise.

I dropped some veggies into too-hot oil and managed to splash my face in several spots. I grabbed a napkin, blotted away the oil and continued chatting with a friend who was over for dinner. It wasn't until later that night, when I finally looked in the mirror, that I realized how close I'd come to putting my eye out! I was burned in three separate places, one a quarter of an inch from my right eye. I've got a faint scar there now, and am extra-super-duper careful when there's oil on the stove.

The worst injury(s) I had were during my short stint as a Prep Cook at a Cooker restaurant. I was taking trays of bacon out of the oven (stacked 5 high, which is TOTALLY safe). When I stepped back to let someone through the close quarters, I tripped on a box right behind me. When I leaned back to get my balance several trays slid toward my face, and the corner of one burned a number-7 shape in my neck. Luckily I was wearing a thick chef coat, so all the boiling hot grease was stopped from burning my neck, shoulders and chest. In reaction to the pain, I tipped forward and dumped all seven full-sheet pans full of bacon onto the floor. My manager was PISSED.

I also sliced into a chunk of my left middle finger while cutting chicken strips. I think that was the last sign that told me to get out of the prep Kitchen before I did serious damage! No stitches, but I still have the scar on the tip of my finger.

I sliced the tip of my index finger on the food processor blade while trying to jam it back onto the spindle to process a second batch of nuts. There was lots of blood, I debated about an ER visit but, lots of paper towels and bandaids later, it eventually stopped bleeding and hurting too much. I still have the scar and little feeling on one side of the fingertip. I never realized before this how sharp those processor blades are. Now why can't my knives be (and stay) as sharp ?

Not mine, but I was there to witness it. My male roommate was cooking a pot roast with Jack Daniels sauce. A few too many people individually decided there was not enough jack in the sauce, so they added extra while the roast was cooking away.
My roommate was standing at the oven cooking on the range and wearing a loose tshirt. The Jack Flashed and the oven door opened, blowing some of the flame up my roommate's shirt. Next thing he knew... no more chest hair.

Knife cut while chopping dark chocolate for a torte. I was holding the chef's knife in my right hand and using my left hand to help push the blade down through the ~2" block of chocolate. I got distracted and let my left thumb slide under the blade as I pushed through the chocolate. Luckily it hit my thumbnail first or I probably would have hacked the tip of my thumb right off.

When I was a teenager I reached up to take down a glass bowl from the top shelf of the cupboard, it fell and the broken pieces bounced and sliced my the inside of my wrist. Thankfully it didn't cut anything really important so there wasn't much blood but I needed 5 stitches. It has been a pain having to explain why I had a scar on my wrist though... "It's not what you think...."

I sliced my thumb open on the lid to a can. That required 5 stitches, and though it's been 9 years, I can't feel the top 1/3 of my thumb.

Also cut my hands innumerable times with knives and have little scars everywhere, but none that needed stitches.

I was roughly five years old, underfoot in my grandmother's tiny kitchen in rural Minnesota. She stepped back to remove a pie from the oven, bumping right into me, and I landed right on the hot oven door with the palms of both my hands. The burns were excruciating, and the worst part was that I couldn't suck my thumb for weeks.

Ms Heather, Kitchen Empress

I once suffered a broken elbow during dinner rush, but my most memorable kitchen injury has to be a chemical burn I received one time from cutting up a pan of jalapenos.

After washing my hands before leaving the kitchen, I thought my hands were free of the pepper juice. As I soon learned, I couldn't have been more wrong... For the next ten minutes I was howling and writing in agony on the floor, wishing to hell I could have "held it" just a little longer.

Moral /dirty joke of the story: latex is your friend. Much like (insert exotic sex worker cliche here), if you cut into a jalapeno unprotected, it'll make you burn.

I have a bunch of small burns on my right hand and arm from hitting the rack on the oven. I really should just take the second one out. The worst one I've heard of, though, happened to a friend of mine who works for a catering company. She had a can of sterno explode on her and had huge scars on her neck and chest for a couple of years. They've faded now, but good grief, she was lucky that didn't get on her face or in her hair.

I managed to lop off the tip of my thumb with my mandoline while trying to julienne carrots. As a bonus, I could identify the cross cuts in the wound.

It frustrates me to no end that I was using the "safety" device when it happened, though. I've since bought a chain-mail oyster glove that I wear whenever using the mandoline now.

How timely. Worst cut ever happened 4 days ago. Daydreaming while chopping an onion with a super-sharp Global chefs knife I sliced into the tip of my left thumb. Took a while to get the blood to stop. Still smarts today.

I've also (alas several times) grabbed the handle of a just-out of the oven pan. Ouch! Maybe someone will develop a handle that glows red when its hot for dopes like me.

Funny you should ask because my last kitchen wound is just in recovery. I was about to chop lengthwise a mini-cucumber when the chef's knife sliped off the back (the shiny part) of the cucumber and landed into my left index pointy finger. With blood and pain, I did take myself to ER and waited an hour and half only to have the would be butterflied by the doc.

Microplane has done some damage to my nails and hands as well, but that happens more often and less painful than the above experience.

Mine was one of those stupid insult-to-injury injuries. I had thrown my back out and was staying home from work. I was just at that point where I was bored out of my mind and moving around a little better, so for some odd reason I decided to make cookies. I'd remembered to use a potholder unlike some of you, but since I was still a bit puny and moving funny, I managed to graze the inside of one arm with the hot tray. Instead of dropping the tray or pushing it away from me, I pulled it towards me and now I have a fun 4" horizontal burn scar right across my belly. And I re-injured my already tender back to boot, and had to spend another day on the floor with my feet up!

Polenta burns on my forearms. Long sleeves, people! That stuff bubbles like lava, sending searing little globs of cornmeal into the air. Contact with the sensitive skin inside forearms is extremely painful, but not a terribly serious injury. No scars.

My husband was making french fries from scratch on a Friday afternoon with little sleep. He jammed an oddly shaped potato in the slot, and started pulling the lever, but the potato needed a little reassurance to stay put...
He's had a fry shaped chunk out of his finger ever since...

When I was a teenager I was cooking dinner one night for my parents, when I accidentally broke one of those glass cooking pots that were popular in the '80's. A shard of glass got impaled in the kitchen floor, which I proceeded to step on. I ended up with 22 stitches between my big toe and the little one next to it. This was about a week before school started, and I spent the next six weeks on crutches.

I once severed a tendon in the last knuckle of my right index finger. I was stupidly not using the hand guard for my mandoline. A carrot got stuck halfway into the julienne blade, and for some unfathomable reason I decided to push it through with my knuckle. In hindsight, I've no idea how I imagined this would turn out well. Fortunately the mandoline blade was so sharp that I had very little pain at the time, just a lot of bleeding and some slightly disturbing lack of control in my fingertip movement. Unfortunately the severed tendon required microsurgery, and 8 weeks of recovery before I could use my primary hand again.

I have issues at parties and my worst injuries are always in front of people.

I was slicing some additional rolls with a sharp serrated knife after too many glasses of wine, started laughing at a friend and sliced through the roll all the way across my palm holding the roll. I aksed "who's not afraid of blood? I might need some help" as most of my guests turned very pale...

At another party I grabbed a white earthenware dish straight off the granite forgot countertop, because I forgot it had just come out of a 450 degree oven. Guests arrived just as tears were running down my face and I had my hand wrapped in an ice filled towel all night.

I have cut some part of my left hand whilst (mis)managing a knife in my right hand on three occasions. I have a scar for each. The first was cutting an apple in my dorm room freshman year of college. The knife went straight through the apple and into my index finger. That one required stitches. The second one was while trying to get into an oyster at an oyster roast a couple of years ago. The most recent was cutting stale French bread for French toast. Very sharp serrated bread knife. Hurts just thinking about it.

I actually don't remember my worst kitchen injury, because I was too young, but I have heard all about over the years. When I was about 2, I was in the kitchen while my parents were making dinner. they turned their backs for just a minute--long enough for me to be intrigued by the glowing red burner. I put my cheek against it and even though it wasn't long I ended up with a lovely coil burn on my cheek.

there are still family and friends who remember me, 25 years later, as the little girl who kissed the stove. luckily, the burn faded pretty quickly and you can't even tell it was ever there. there is a gap though in my childhood pictures--I guess no one wanted to immortalize the burn.

When I was five or six and not quite tall enough to see over the edge of the chop block, I lifted my head up to stick my chin over the edge and set it down smack on top of a cookie pan straight out of the oven. I had an awesome scab from that one.

A few years ago, after a few beers, I reached into the oven to flip a taquito that was browning too fast. The taquito zinged my finger, I winced, my arm came down hard on the very, very hot roasting pan. I had a burn the size of a $.50 piece healing for about a month, and it still looks like I have an old, fading bruise on that part of my arm.

I cut off the end of my ring finger with a serrated bread knife...while trying to slice a bagel. It didn't hurt at the time...but later...WOW! My finger tip is still numb. Bagels: the devil's bread I tell you! :)

I was working for a caterer, out setting up someone's holiday party. Number one rule: don't light the flame under the chafing pans without putting water in the pans. I come along, see chafing pans with no water and assume that they are not lit (especially as I was working with the owner of the company that night), pick one up at the edge and slide my palm full length down the bottom of the pan to pick it up....YEOWCH!! Yep, she had lit the burner without filling the pans with water. I ended up going to get it looked at the next day and getting a prescription burn cream (thank goodness for that stuff, it's amazing!)

I was baking a cake a few years back and reached in the oven to test for doneness. I underestimated how low I needed to bend over and reach. The top of my left hand got singed on the coil (while red, yes electric). It took a few seconds for the pain to start, but it was black and white where there was direct contact. Ouch!

8 stitches in left middle finger and cauterized left index finger after the bread knife met the cold bagel when i was not fully paying attention. stupid stupid stupid, but all better now.

like Hannah, my worst kitchen injury involved a cucumber, a knife, and my left index finger. i was chopping the cuke as part of prep for a party & sliced off part of the tip of my finger. after some debate, took a cab to the ER, where they basically could only bandage it & give me a tetanus shot. it's still numb after a few years & if you compare it with my other index finger you can see where it's missing a bit.

the injury maybe should've been a sign that we should cancel the party, but of course we didn't & it was a dark, crazy, weird night (but not in a particularly good way) :-)

i have a pretty scar by my "index knuckle" of my right hand from a glass that broke after i had squeezed my hand inside to wash it (since it didn't shatter completely and since it was no longer compressing my hand, my hand drove itself deep onto the new sharp edge -- i use a fat oxo bottle brush for glasses now) but my most painful injury and worst scars are from a flan-making accident.

caramelizing sugar is REALLY, REALLY, REALLY hot. and it doesn't fall off like water does.

Add me to the list of mandoline victims. I used the safety guard, but my hands were wet and it slipped, taking a chunk of my pinky finger with it.
I immediately grabbed my hand and somehow knocked the phone off the hook and called my husband. He took me to the emergency room, but no stitches could have been made (it was a clean cut and its not like theres a whole lot of extra skin for them to pull together).
Best part was getting home and discovering, in all of my panicked flapping around, I had turned the gas stove on (but it didnt light) so we had to spend the night on the main level of our loft apartment with the windows wide open and pray we didnt die in our sleep.

p.s. I totally have a picture taken the next day. My BFF is totally gross and insisted.

*** CAUTION *** It kind of looks like my pinky's brain exploded.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/americnjewl/157974180/

I was 19 and taking my first ever apple tart from a 425 degree oven to the dining table. I accidentally pushed the false bottom of the pan up and the ring slid onto my wrist, branding myself with the fluted edge.

Hubs has me beat- when he was about 1 year old, his older sister gave him an orange and a knife. He sliced right through a tendon and cannot bend his thumb. Nasty scars all over his hand.

Who gives a one year old a knife?!?

I got a third degree burn from dropping a hot onion on my foot as I was straining a broth. Now I wait until they are cool before I strain them.

yikes! some of these injuries are scary! my worst was when i was washing dishes...i stuck my hand--forcefully--into a tall glass to wash the inside. it broke and sliced the side of my hand. didn't get stitches, but maybe should have, since i now have a nasty scar.

When I was quite young, my mother had a pizza restaurant. I was probably five or so and was trying to be helpful (sigh), by opening a giant can of tomato sauce with the giant, counter-mounted can opener... I don't remember what slipped, but I do clearly remember that it was *fast*, and as I held up my forearm to see it better, I had sliced open the top of my middle finger on my left hand, and the blood was dripping quickly down off my elbow, summarily followed by my mother's screaming. Ohhh I can laugh about it now, and marvel how much my hands have grown that the scar has seperated into two check marks on my knuckles.

Then's there is the adult fun of chopping onions then my thumb in half. Classic. Thank goodness for stitches.

I cut off the tip of my left thumb about once every six months with my Global knife.

I dropped the heavy cover of my 8 qt Lodge cast-iron Dutch often, which fell edge first into my leg as I automatically brought my knee up to catch it.

And I still have a very nasty scar that never healed right and is still painful years later from a cheese planer accident.

Got 2:

Worked at a bakery, rolling out fondant with a rolling pin (so you gotta push pretty hard to get it thin) and without seeing it, with a lot of force, pushed the rolling pin forward, and my hand went right against the razor sharp cake leveler we used (giant super sharp bread knife on its side basically) I sliced my pinky to the bone and almost passed out.

Other was cooking a roux (equal parts fat and flour cooked in a pan to thicken and flavor sauces, if anyone didn't know) And had to add a pound of ground meat to stop the roux from cooking. Got my brother to help who thought nothing of dumping the pound of meat in the pot fast so the roux splashed up on my arm. It hit mostly my wrist. Took long enough for me to register the pain I was in with the fact that this thick kitchen napalm, essentially, was burning into me that by the time I got it off I had a wonderful 3rd degree burn (if anyone is curious, 3rd degree burns turn an sickly shade of gray pretty quickly) It took forever to heal and I have a very odd large raised scar on my wrist now.