Sunday Afternoon

Had a great time last night watching my Bears beat Iowa State. Some other really great news is that I woke up this morning to a beautiful sound. Rain.

A much welcomed sight down here. So it got me thinking, what better to make on a rainy day to eat while watching football than a big pot of chili. I've made plenty of different chili variations in my day but my dad has been trying to get me to make his recipe for awhile. I had him text me the ingredients before he boarded a flight to Malaysia and I got it just in time. His side of the family is from up North, so I'm going to just name this recipe Yankee Chili. If any of y'all are reading right now, this one goes out to you.

This is the first recipe that I've decided to post and it's pretty basic. So far all the food that I've made and posted about has been pretty simple stuff but I'm still getting use to blogging and I will definitely be posting some of my more impressive things in the future.

Yankee Chili:
1 large yellow onion
1 bell pepper
3 cloves garlic
1 jalapeno
1 lb ground beef (I used deer meat)
1 can chili (no beans)
2 cans red kidney beans
1 can chopped tomatoes
64 oz bottle V8
seasonings to taste (I used 2 tbsp chili powder, 1 tbsp cayenne, 1 tbsp salt)

Basically you give all the raw stuff a rough chop and saute in veg oil. Add the meat and brown. Add all canned items and the V8. At this point it is ready for consumption but I like to actually cook the stuff instead of just cook the stuff, if you know what I mean. I usually let it sit at medium low heat for about an hour and then add my seasonings. After that I'll let it sit for the rest of the day on low to really soften up the veggies and let the flavors all marry together.

Normally I would have made a big batch of cornbread to eat with it, but I had a bunch of leftover rolls and biscuits so I left the cornbread out. But don't worry, we still managed to Southern this meal up. Jessica made some Texas caviar (great stuff, you can look up the recipe for that online anywhere) and we ate it with Ritz crackers and pimento cheese. Also, as you can see in the picture, we had a bowl of popcorn and M&Ms as well, the greatest pairing of foodstuffs known to man. It isn't shown in the picture but the best way to eat this chili is with some shredded cheddar cheese and a fat dollop of sour cream.

We went and saw Ides of March this afternoon so be expecting that.