Man hides $15,000 of Aussie dollars in oven, wife bakes it

Melted lumps of the plastic based notes was that was left of the unfortunate unnamed man's $15,000 AU, taken from the sale of his Toyota Supra.

The hapless man, who didn't want to be named, told ninemsn "It was everything I had; I've got nothing to my name. That money was supposed to go towards my mortgage. I had a call from Westpac [bank] on Tuesday asking me when I would pay because I missed a payment on Monday."

His wife had decided to heat up some chicken nuggets for the couple's two children - the mystery man said he thought the bank notes would be safe in the oven, since his wife never used it.

The family, from the Sydney suburb of Merrylands, are facing financial difficulty and have recently had their water supply cut off due to lack of bill payments.

"After a while it started to sink in, you've got kids, a mortgage, a family car to run and I'm thinking what am I going to do," he continued.

Australia was the first country to make bank notes from a polymer based plastic - which are said to last 4 times longer than regular paper bank notes and far less likely to be counterfeited.

However, unfortunately for the family, the notes aren't ovenproof.