Chicken Chili: It's What's for Breakfast

Those of you who know me outside this blog in "real life" know I have been fighting a cold/Captain Tripps-esque misery for a week. It is raining this morning and nothing sounded good except for my leftover chicken chili from Tuesday. So even with the shaking of my husband's head in the background, my breakfast was served. I think the jalapeño is helping my sinuses.

Find the recipe at: http://www.mypodcooks.com/recipes/slow-cooker-chicken-chili

Sunday Supper: Mom's Chili

I learned to make chili from my mom and a few years ago she gave me her recipe. She can't remember where she got it from but it's the chili she has cooked for years and I get to share the recipe with you!

Mom's Chili

Ingredients

• 2.5 lb ground chuck
  
• 2 cups chopped onion
  
• 1 chopped green pepper
  
• 2 cloves garlic pressed
  
• 3 Tbsp chili powder
  
• 1.5 tsp oregano
  
• 1 tsp basil
  
• 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
  
• 2 tsp ground cumin
  
• 1 tsp sugar
  
• 2 tsp salt
  
• 2 cans whole tomatoes, undrained
  
• 2 cans tomato sauce
  
• 1 can tomato paste
  
• 2 cans kidney beans, light and dark or both same
  

Cooking Directions

1. Cook meat until no longer pink and then drain. 
2. Reserve meat and add onion and green pepper to pan. 
3. Next add garlic and all remaining spices. 
4. Stir in the ground beef and the remaining ingredients except beans. 
5. Bring to a boil. 
6. Simmer 1 hour and then add the beans.
7. Cook another 15 minutes.
   

Simple right? Now me being me and The Cook Crook after all, I don't actually follow this recipe to the letter. In fact, since Sunday's meal was in fact chili, I started it this morning before we all headed to church. Once I browned my meat and reserved it, I sauteed both red and yellow onion and omitted the green pepper all together. My husband likes spice so too the mix I added some fresh chili peppers from this handy kitchen helper:

I live by these little tubes now!

Anyway, I then added 1 can of diced tomatoes and green chiles and a new product made by Hunt's that is tomato sauce seasoned for chili. The only change I made to the spices in mom's recipe was I cut back to 2 tablespoons of chili powder instead of 3 to account for the seasoned sauce. With no other tomatoes or suace added, this by itself would make wonderful hot dog chili!

Today the chili went into the slow cooker and I added the remaining ingredients and if you were in my house right now, you would definitely smell chili! Nothing like it when it cooks all day and those flavors come together!

I love chili and have won a few chili competitions just by experimenting with my Mom's basic recipe. Have any chili tips to share? Let me know! And as always send in your "cook crook" moments as I would love to share them.

Travel Spot: Ben's Chili Bowl

I love shows about food and the Travel Channel's Man v. Food is no exception! In fact, it's a favorite in our house the whole family enjoys and we have often talked about visiting some of the sites host Adam Richman has in his show.

Well, this Saturday, we went to McLean, VA to visit friends and as we usually day, planned a day trip into Washington D.C. for part of our weekend. I insisted we try out Ben's Chili Bowl which had been featured on Man v. Food AND because I love, I mean love chili dogs.( My husband can attest to this since I think my diet when I was pregnant with our son consisted of about 50% chili dogs at some point during the 9 months).

Anyway, we went there for lunch at 1:30PM on a Saturday. We expected a line and there was one but it moved pretty quickly (15-20 minutes total) and soon we were inside ordering at the counter and watching them grill hot dogs and their signature "half-smokes" and smelling chili. 

We had hungry kids and the place was small, and loud and crowded as we placed our order but can I tell you how wonderfully sweet the folks behind the counter were? Even as I attempted to pass myself off as someone who knew what they were ordering, I got a "sweetie" , several smiles and when she told me she would bring the food to us and bring the check later...I didn't care if it was the best chili ever, it made my day.

So, the four of us sat down to one plain hot dog for the little guy, a large bowl of chili for hubby, a small bowl of chili for the 11-year old, one chocolate milkshake, 1 vanilla milkshake, 1 basket of fries, and for me, the famous chili half-smoke. Let me again remind you that I love chili and love chili dogs and then I will say BEST CHILI DOG EVER!! My son said "Mommy, I REALLY like this hot dog place!" And when my dear step-daughter said it was the best chili she ever had (even better than mine), I knew our trip had been really worth it (and that I need to tweak my own recipe some...LOL)!

So thanks to Ben's Chili Bowl for a wonderful family lunch and a great experience.