Nothing says Merry Christmas like a bowl of green chili

Ok, maybe a new 50'' TV or a 60's Fender re-issue would do the trick. But more practically, the gift of food will have to do. Feliz Navidad!

While different sources will tell you different things about the influence of food color on taste (note: I made this up, but let's assume it's been scientifically debated) something about the color of this chili made it perfect for the occasion. By something about the color I mean it is green and red. So. Innovative. I've never been to New Mexico, but the smell of these chilis while roasting in the oven is what I would imagine every day in Santa Fe would be like. That and hot air balloon festivals. And Jesse Pinkmans. It must be an incredible place to reside.

Make this chili any time of year, but definitely make this for a little Mexican/West Coast infused holiday. This is some G-13 medical grade chili. I'd call it Chronic Chili, but my friends at Lagunitas Brewing Co. already did that with their red chili.

So here we go:

For the chili:

- 3(ish) lb. boneless pork shoulder.
- 1.5 lb. tomatillos
- 2 poblano peppers
- 1 red pepper
- 1 or 2 jalapeno depending on how much spice you want
- 5 cloves of garlic
- 2 yellow onions
- 1 bunch cilantro
- 1 Tbsp cumin
- 1 Tbsp smoked serrano powder if you can get it, or roast 1 seranno pepper
- 1 or 2 Tbsp mexican oregano 
- Optional: Some kind of white bean, like lima

Garnish on top yo' bowl:
- Limes
- Flour tortillas
- More cilantro



1. CHILI ROAST. Take your tomatillos, chili's, garlic, and other peppers and put them on a baking sheet. Cut the tomatillos in half cross wise. Throw them in the oven and set your oven to broil. It was a complete mystery to me for a while what the hell the broiler was for, but it's great when you just want to heat something from above (Think: Melt Nacho Cheese. Munch Now Children).

2. After they are getting nice and blackened, take them out and throw in a blender or food processor with half your cilantro bunch. Pulse this warm chili-cilantro mixture into a nice smooth mixture. It will look almost like salsa.

 3. Get your meat ready to bronze. Be good to your pork shoulder. Trim some of it's fat off before it meets its death by hot oil. Slice into pretty large 1 inch chunks, and go heavy on the salt and pepper. Pork likes liberal use of salt. While the pork is browning, throw in your cumin and any other chili powder you want to add in.

 4. After several minutes with your pork having some nice browned sides, take it out of the pot. Next you want to start the onions for your chili. I used some of the fat from the pork as the base for cooking the onions. Do this unless you just hate fat. But if that's the case, you're probably not ready any of this to begin with. Once the onions are done, throw in your pork and the green chili sauce you made. Next, add in enough chicken broth just to cover the meat. You shouldn't need a lot because the chili sauce is plenty of liquid. Admire how green your chili sauce is.

 5. At this point, you're pretty much done. You could also add in beans here if you wanted. Or chorizo. Or doritos. But no, beans really are good in this. Get the chili up to a boil, then turn the heat to low. Sit back, have a holiday cocktail, and let this cook for at least 2-3 hours. You want the pork to be fall apart tender, and this will take a little time. But well worth it my friend.


          Before....                                                                           .....3 hours later

There aint no time to stash the gumbo

Or rattle around in a cage. Huh? Yes, these are lyrics to a song, and I have no idea what what they mean. But in honor of this particular band celebrating 30 years of touring this week, it was about damn time to make some gumbo. While the song Gumbo has absolutely nothing to do with the food, nor do I think it has much to do with anything, I feel like I needed to honor this band that has given me plenty of good memories over the years.

Why do I go see them year after year? For the chance to see them create something new on stage, and most of the time they do. Not always a new song, but just taking an old song in a different direction, with no path or end in sight. Sometimes, the new sound they explore within a song they've played hundreds of times lands flat. But more often than not, you're left wondering how they didn't plan this before stepping on stage, it's so good it had to have been practiced.

Much in the same way, cooking provides this type of exploration and chance to create something new. You can take a dish you've made many times and throw in a new ingredient, see how it tastes. It might not turn out great, or the different ingredient won't add much. But it's the only way to learn what's good together. Or, you can just try making something new, a first time played so to speak.

Ok, enough of this soapbox talk. My first time played is gumbo, something I've wanted to try making for a while but laziness often got the best of me. Gumbo is not something to make if you don't have a little time and don't mind standing over a stove for a little bit. But the payoff is worth it. Just put on some of your favorite mindless television or a good album, and you will be just fine. This recipe is adapted from a few different sources, Saveur and Simply Recipes


What you need:
- Boneless Chicken Thighs: 1 lb
- Andouille Sausage or Kielbasa: 1 lb
- Bacon: a few slices
- Okra: about 1/2 lb
- 1 Green pepper
- 1 Red pepper
- 1 Serrano pepper
- 4 Celery stalks
- 1 Onion
- 4 cloves Garlic
- Tomato Paste
- 1 32oz box Chicken stock
- 1 14oz can diced tomatoes
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 cup oil


 Seasoning:
- A few Tbsp. Cajun seasoning. This is good to have if you don't have it. You can use it on chicken, black beans, whatever.
- 1 Tbsp. Thyme
- Hot sauce: as much as you want
- Salt & pepper



1. First thing to do is kind of an optional step, but after cooking a stew with okra before and finding out the hard way, you might find it necessary. Okra give off this weird slimy texture, which helps thicken the gumbo. But one way to get rid of this is to cook them in a pan for a few minutes, just so they cook down a bit. You could also roast them in the oven, but let's not get too crazy here.

Okra are more than OK

 2. Next you want to brown the bacon, sausage, and chicken. Throw plenty of salt and pepper on the chicken while it's cooking. Take the meat and okra, set it aside.

 











3. The next part is the what separates gumbo from the rest. What gives it its brownish color is the Roux that you will make. That's ROO for the nonfrancophone among us. You make this by heating up the leftover oil from browning your meat, along with some additional oil (about 1/2 cup in total). You want to slowly add flour to this warming oil, and keep stirring. You will see it starts to thicken, and scrape the bottom of the pan to get the good stuff. Do this for a little while, maybe 20-30 minutes, until your roux is a nice brownish color. Mine wasn't the best, I could have kept cooking it but I got hungry and anxious.

Need

More

Cowbell

4. Once you're done with this somewhat exhausting step, it's time to add your veggies to the pot. Here you use what they call the Holy Trinity of vegetables. Onions, bell pepper, celery. Aka awesomeness. I added garlic and serrano pepper, so we'll call it the Fab 5.

Trinity

Tangled up in Roux

 5. After a few minutes with this mixture getting nice, add in your tomatoes. While this is cooking, you want to heat the chicken broth separately. This will help when you add it in because it will absorb the roux and get all the brown bits off the bottom of your pan. So heat the chicken stock, then add it to this mixture.

Now you can add in your seasonings/hot sauce and that trifecta meat/okra mixture you cooked earlier. Let this all heat up and start simmering. Once it is simmering you can lower the heat, and let it cook pretty much as long as you want, but at least about 45 minutes. The vegetables will all cook and the gumbo will start to thicken. Make some white rice on the side, top with hot sauce, and you're gettin down on some gumbo!

 

Green salsas are salsas too, ok?

Winter is officially on the way. Jackets are out, heat is cranking, and hot coffee in the morning never seemed so good. The food choices in the market start to change as more root vegetables come into season. But thanks to our west coast/Florida friends, we can still get fresh produce shipped in that reminds us summer will be back around before we know it. Or it reminds us we could be living somewhere with warm weather year round. Or maybe it reminds us how much we just loooove the change of seasons. I never believed this was a thing, until every new englander drove this into my head so much that it's starting to stick.

Next time you are in dire need of a dose of fresh citrus summer, try this salsa out. It's refreshing, and GREEN. Everyone likes green things these days. I used to see this kind of stuff in taco shops all over San Francisco, and heard it called 'taco shop guacamole'. It's definitely not guacamole as you or I know it, but it's definitely good on tacos. The best part is, it will last longer than guacamole so you can keep it around for whenever you need. Think: eggs, sandwiches, chips, hot dogs?, you name it.

So make some a 'dis, and put it on whatever you like.

What you need:

- TOMATILLOS: I always use different amounts because I'm not mr. exacto, but I would say 8oz is the magic number
- Cilantro: About a cup of leaves
- Avocado: 1
- White Onion: Half of it
- Serrano Pepper: 1
- Lime Juice: 1 or 2 fresh limes
- Salt: As much as you want you
- Chilis in Adobo: 1 or 2 (I add these, you don't have to but it gives a little extra smoky kind of flavor)



Here's what you do:
You will need a food processor or some other type of blender. The good part about having one is, it will do pretty much everything for you. Just slice things up a little bit like you see below, blend, and you are done. Taste test for salt amount, you might want to add more salt at the end.

Now enjoy your delectably dank green salsa.

Chicken Breasts: From Ashy to Classy

Need to impress your lady/guy friend? Trying to woo a potential lady/guy friend? Or just want to be good to yourself? Show them you can make a whole meal. That's right, we're talking protein, grains, AND vegetables on a plate. Separately. Maybe even go buy some fresh bread, WHO KNOWS?? She won't get angry with you next time you insist on having a full glass of water next to your bed like you do every night, and then proceed to take 2 sips. He won't get angry with you the next time you plan out his saturday 3 weeks in advance. Food brings harmony to all.

For the record, I made this meal for myself. I was woo'ed. Didn't even need another date to express myself.

The other considerable woo factor of this meal is the cherry tomatoes. These oh' sweet nuthins are anything but.



What you need:

- Chicken cutlets: 1.5 lbs. thinly sliced
- Cherry tomatoes: About half a container, cut in half
- Shallots: a few, sliced up
- Broccoli, or any other vegetable you want
- Garlic: a few cloves, sliced up
- Flour
- Balsamic Vinegar: a healthy dose
- Chicken broth (optional)
- Olive oil
- Butter
- Some kind of rice and seasoning, I used a box of Near East Rice Pilaf (because we can't make EVERYTHING)




Here's the deal:

1. First you want to pat your chicken breasts dry and coat them in flour. This may seem like a pointless step, but it helps crisp up your chicken and and gives some GOLDEN BROWN HUES. You will see the difference and be happy you did it. Mix in plenty of salt, pepper, and any kind of seasoning you have around, like a little dried rosemary, basil,  or oregano. If you don't have these don't worry, most of the flavor will come from the sauce.



Throw in some olive and a couple tablespoons of butter in your frying pan and get the heat cranking pretty high. The key for GOLDEN BROWN HUES is a hot pan.

2. While your chicken is browning, cut up your garlic, shallots, and tomatoes.

Depending how thick your chickens are, you probably want to cook them about 5-7 minutes per side. Once they are done, take the chicken out of the pan and put aside. It's time for flavor juice.

3. Add in your garlic and shallots, let them cook a few minutes to start looking nice. Next, add in your tomatoes. With the pan still hot, throw in your balsamic vinegar. Stand back, and soak in the balsamic heaven in your kitchen. 

You are almost done. After a minute or so the vinegar will cook down to more of a gravy type consistency. You can add in some chicken broth here if you want more sauce, but you don't want too much liquid. Bring your chicken back to the pan to mix it around and absorb sauce. Does this make you hungry ->>>

Final Step: Put this whole chicken tomato love fest on a pan ready for the oven. Sprinkle some parmesan cheese on top if you prefer things covered in cheese. It would be totally acceptable here. Put in the oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes. While the chicken is in the oven, pan fry or steam your broccoli. I mix in some soy/rice vinegar for the broccoli, but you could just eat them as is.

This is a meal you will want to have the leftovers for days, so be good to yourself and buy plenty of chicken. It's simple, but good. Happy woo'ing.

 

 

Mo' Chili Mo' Problems

More Chili? More meat?

This blog would never look like it, but I actually eat pretty light during the week. Maybe I'll get around to posting some healthy recipe soon. In the meantime, we have PORK ON PORK chili. That's right. Double dose of the good stuff. This would anger those cattle country Texans and make absolutely no sense to Carolina pork territory. Barely made sense to me, but it turned out great.

What you need:

- 1.5 lbs chorizo. If you can, get fresh chorizo (whole foods has it). It is ideal. You can take the casing off and it will brown up well. You want a fresh sausage that will crumble up. We like crumbles.
- A Few strips of bacon. Or an entire package. Has anyone ever complained about TOO MUCH BACON?
- 1 Yellow Onion
- 1 Pepper. I used a green poblano for a smoky flavor, but you could use whatever.
- 1 Spicy Pepper. I used a serrano, again use whatever you can find.
- Garlic: a few cloves
- Black beans: 1 small can (14oz).
- Diced Tomato: 1 large can (28oz)
- Tomato Paste. If you have it, this helps thicken the chili. If not just cook the chili longer or use less broth.
- Chilis in Adobo Sauce: 1 small can, you will find these if you look hard enough most stores have them. Cut them up.
- Corn: buy some frozen corn, use your judgement on how much you want.


Seasonings:
- Chili Powder. I used a mixture of Ancho Powder and New Mexican Hot. Just use something that smells good to you. Of all the seasonings, use the chili powder the most. This is chili after all.
- Cumin. Maybe a quarter of the amount of chili powder you use.
- Paprika. Same as cumin.
- Garlic Powder. As much as you want. A little extra garlic never hurt nobody.
- Hot Sauce. A few drops.
- Spicy mustard. A few drops.
- Apple cider vinegar. A few drops.


First things first, be good to your meat. Brown it up nice. Throw in the bacon and chorizo and get your kitchen smelling insane. Is it time for breakfast? Or am I at a taqueria? Maybe breakfast tacos? Brain overload.

Chorizo Bacon Heaven

Once the meat is browned up nice, take it out and set it aside. Try to keep yourself from eating all of this amazing meat mixture before it meets its impending death by chili. Try saying My Meat Meets Me Monday 5 times fast to past the time.

Now it's time for the base. Get your onion, garlic, and peppers in the pot. Let them cook down nice for 5 minutes.

 Once they have cooked down, add in your beans, corn, chili in adobo, and tomatoes. Then bring the meat plate back to the party. Let them all hangout together for a few, before blasting them with your seasonings.

 Flavor Dust

 Cornstorm

After the seasonings have cooked a bit with your mixture, you can start drowning this innocent party in beer and broth. I used about half a beer along with about 14 oz chicken broth. Let this heat up, start bubbling, and then put it on low for as long as you want. After a couple hours all the ingredients will be melded together in one big happy chili family.

This was part of a larger chili cook off this weekend with a few friends. The pork chili is in the bottom right. Props to Mitchell and Lauren on the chicken chickpea chili at the top!

Have more chili ideas? Chickpea cheeseburger?! Send them my at gdonheiser@gmail.com

Jamaican Me Curry, Mon

Keeping with the theme of fall colors, here's a pretty simple Jamaican Chicken/Potato Curry. Something tells me they don't have fall in Jamaica, but if they did, this would be perfect.

I've made different types of curries before that have turned out good, but not that good. This one is currazy good, simple, and doesn't take much effort at all. I always get scared when I see a website mention a recipe as a "weeknight dinner", envisioning a child running out of my cabinet at any moment asking when dinner is on the table. Future he/she probably won't eat this anyways, so I will be reduced to eating kraft mac and cheese. Curry mac? Man can dream. Thankfully, I'm not there yet, so weeknight dinner usually means "something with leftovers so I don't have to buy lunch/dinner the next day". So ya, I'd call this a good "weeknight dinner".

What you need:

- 1 Lb Chicken thighs or breasts, whatever you're into. Thighs have more flavor/more fat. So obviously go for the thighs if you're on the fence.
- A couple potatoes. Slice em up on the smaller side.
- 1 onion
- 1 green pepper
- 1 spicy pepper. I used a habanero and this shit was HOT. Typical Jamaican would call for Scotch Bonnet pepper, but when we ain't in Jamaica we make due with what we got.
- A few cloves of garlic
- A small piece piece of ginger. Take the skin off, dice up.
- 1 can regular coconut milk
- 1 cup of chicken broth
- a few drops of rice vinegar. If you don't have this, get some. It's a good thing to have any time you make a marinade,  but only if you're into that kind of thing, think you might like to be into that kind of thing, or just like the thought of something "marinating". It does sound lovely.
- Hot sauce




















Seasoning:
- 3 - 4 Tbsp. Curry Powder. There are tons of curry powders out there, so you can easily get lost. Every country just HAD to come up with their own version of a curry spice. I love them for it, but my cabinet does not. For this recipe, you want a yellow curry powder. One with the word "Jamaican" in it would be ideal, but you may not find that. Try. If not, a Thai version will probably work fine.


So here's the deal. Slice up the garlic, onions, ginger, throw it in a pot with some olive oil heating. Take a chill pill and LET THIS MIXTURE GET NICE.

When the onions are lookin' nice, add in green pepper, spicy pepper, and curry powder. Use plenty of curry powder as it is the showstopper of this dish.

 After a minute of the curry powder cooking, and your kitchen smelling AMAZE, throw in your chicken. Now we're getting nice.

After about 5-7 minutes with the chicken cooking, throw in the potatoes. After another minute, add in the coconut milk, chicken broth, rice vinegar, and hot sauce. Get this simmering and let it cook on low for 20-30 minutes until the sauce starts to thicken.

For a side dish, make some rice. Or buy a bag of microwavable rice if doing one thing was enough for one tired weeknight. Pat yourself on the back at work the next day when you microwave this and the entire office smells like curry. They stopped thinking about e-mails to follow up on for a few seconds and were transported to a tropical island, so job well done.

Have other curry type recipe ideas? Send them my way!

gdonheiser@gmail.com

The fall chill

Fall is here, and what better way to warm up from the chill in the air than a warm bowl a 'red chili.

Something about the month of October kicks off the chili craving in me. Football games. Early sun sets. The cool red/yellow autumn colors everywhere. Chili only seems appropriate in the summer when it's covering a hot dog. But here we are, a week away from halloween, prime chili time.

I've been wanting to make a really good red chili, but I usually go for the chili verde/pork varieties. But Saturdays are for BEEF, or at least that was the thought process this weekend. Follow to the end for recipe.


A few things to know:

> DO make this chili if you want to make something that will feed a bunch of people, or alternatively feed yo' lazy self for days.
> DO make this chili if you like to try throwing different things in a pot and seeing how they turn out. It's not always perfect, but sometimes it's the only way to learn what tastes good together. Learning is good mmmkay?
> DO make this chili if you like a little to a lot of spice in yourlife.










                               Peppas, Onions, Celery, Garlic                                                       Family Photo

 

After browning the beef and then cooking down the vegetables, it was time to throw this concoction together. In addition to chili powder, I tried using dried chilis, which turned out great. I put them in some boiling beef broth for about 5 minutes, then sliced them for the chili mixture. You can see them in the picture below. At left is the dried Ancho, in the right they are the small brownish red mixture on the right side of the pot.

             Dried Ancho Chilis                                                                             One big happy chili family              

 

 Pouring in some of the finest ale to kick this chili up a notch.

  

                Everything in the pot, time for a beer...                                          ....6 hours later

 

The following is the list of things I used. In some cases, I know how much of an ingredient I used. In others, I have no idea. Which is fantastic. For anyone who worries about the exact part of cooking, make chili. It's pretty forgiving. Worst thing that can happen is it will be too spicy, too salty, or just downright weird, but someone will eat it.

For the chili:

- 2 lbs. boneless chuck. This is good meat for chili as you can get it in chunks or chop it yourself. The longer you cook the chili, the more it breaks down. And the longer you cook the chili, the more beers you can drink
- 2 cans beans (small cans 14 oz). I used red kidney, but you can use whatever you want. Equal Opportunity Employer.
- 1 can diced tomatoes (big can 28 oz).
- 1 can fire roasted crushed tomatoes (small can)
- Some tomato paste (optional, but helps chili consistency make its middle to high school leap from soup to stew)
- 3 celery stalks
- 2 or 3 bell peppers. Again, use whatever color you like.
- 1 serrano pepper. Dem spicy ones.
- 2 yellow onions
- 4 cloves garlic
- 2 dried ancho chiles (optional)

Seasonings to throw in:
- Chili powder might be a good idea. I used a mix of regular New Mexican red powder with a dark Ancho chile powder to give a more smoky taste. Be creative, and use liberally.

- Cumin: couple Tbsp
- Paprika: 1 Tbsp
- Garlic powder: 1 Tbsp
- Apple cider vinegar: This stuff adds a sweet vinegar flavor that you will love. Worth buying a bottle if you don't have it and start using it in salad dressings (if you make those, I don't) and marinades.
- Soy Sauce: A couple shakes of the bottle
- Cacao powder aka chocolate powder: Whole Foods tells me it's a Mayan superfood, so I kind of HAD TO GET IT. Use 1 Tbsp, chocolate helps thicken the chili and deepen the flavor. You don't have to do this.
- Half a beer. Drink other half. Open another one.
- Small amount of Beef broth. Maybe half a normal size box.
- Hot sauce: throw in as much as you want, just take it easy to start