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  • Chili! Chili! Chili!

    Yes, it's another foodie thread! YAY!

    Okay, I have made chili three times in my life. The first time was for a local chili cookoff and I took second place. The second time was for a different local chili cookoff and I took fourth place in the traditional category. (There were no categories in the first cookoff.)

    Well, next weekend, there are TWO chili cookoffs. One on Saturday the 13th and one on Sunday the 14th. Needless to say, I am stoked. I get another two cracks at the top prize (whatever it is, I don't care, I just want to win, damn it! ), and I get another chance at tweaking my chili recipe to get it where it needs to be.

    Now I have a friend, Cookie. Cookie is a lovely young lady who, like me, loves to cook. Hell, she has been known to cook great big batches of stuff just to bring in to her local bar to feed the staff and the regulars. In any case, in the second chili cookoff mentioned above, Cookie took 2nd in the hot category. And she and I started talking food and cooking.

    With the two chili cookoffs coming up, we are having a blast. And while we are each going to cook our own chilis in each cookoff, we are also going to collaborate on a third chili. So last night we got together to brain storm.

    And what a brain storm it was! We had a lot of great ideas about what direction we could go, but we both knew that we did not want to do something standard with the collaboration....we wanted something different. (Our own chilis are both going to be more on the traditional side.) So after many beers, looking up some basic recipes to get an idea, we finally settled on something that is either going to be spectacular, or a spectacular failure: a Triple Mollusk White Chili, using clams, oysters, mussels, and white beans, among other things.

    This is going to be FUN!


    .................................................. .......................... .................................................. .......................
    Last edited by Jester; 03-06-2010, 11:16 PM.

    "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
    Still A Customer."


  • #2
    Sounds tasty Jester. What are you going to use to give the White Chili some kick?
    Ridiculous 2009 Predictions: Evil Queen will beat Martha Stewart to death with a muffin pan. All hail Evil Queen! (Some things don't need elaboration.....) -- Jester

    Ridiculous 2010 Predictions: Evil Queen, after escaping prison for last years prediction, goes out and waffle irons Rachel Ray to death. -- SG15Z

    Ridiculous 2011 Prediction: Evil Queen will beat Gordon Ramsay over the head with a cast-iron skillet. -- FireHeart

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    • #3
      Stab that dish with a clampoon!

      (A. Guthrie, Reuben Clamzo)
      I am not an a**hole. I am a hemorrhoid. I irritate a**holes!
      Procrastination: Forward planning to insure there is something to do tomorrow.
      Derails threads faster than a pocket nuke.

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      • #4
        Quoth Evil Queen View Post
        What are you going to use to give the White Chili some kick?
        Oh, we have some ideas. Looking at my notes, I see various peppers that will work, white and black pepper, garlic, onions, cumin, cilantro, Old Bay....we don't want it TOO spicy, but we do want some kick. And we want the seasonings to complement the seafood and the creaminess of the chili. Yes, it will be creamy. Yes, we have no idea if that will work or not. Now, it's not going to be kicking down the doors like either of our other chilis, that's for sure. Won't come close to the ideas we talked about for if we just wanted to make a mouth scorcher. But we plan on definitely waking up the tastebuds a bit!

        "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
        Still A Customer."

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        • #5
          Sounds interesting, can you explain what a cook off is? We don't have them here?
          Customer "why did you answer the phone if you can't help me?"

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          • #6
            My friend Bender regularly makes chili for both regular eating and cookoffs. The last one the biker club he belongs to, he took first place with the hottest chili. He received the a** burner award.

            He calls his chili Biohazard, and he's had people offer to pay him to make them some. We figured he should go into business with it.


            Eric the Grey
            In memory of Dena - Don't Drink and Drive

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            • #7
              Biohazard. I like it!

              TA, a cookoff is basically just a cooking competition. In this case, a chili cooking competition. People who like to cook get together and compete by offering up their dish to judges and/or the public. Different cookoffs have different rules and methods for determining winners. Sometimes they have entry fees, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they have big prizes, sometimes they have small prizes, and sometimes all they have is bragging rights.

              Hope that explains it better.

              "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
              Still A Customer."

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              • #8
                Oh, I forgot the funniest part. Previous batches of his chili has burned the Teflon off his chili pot.

                And he wonders why I pass up the opportunity to try it. I'm a lightweight as it is. Nope, not going there...


                Eric the Grey
                In memory of Dena - Don't Drink and Drive

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                • #9
                  Quoth Eric the Grey View Post
                  Previous batches of his chili has burned the Teflon off his chili pot.
                  Now I could be wrong, but that sound more like a cooking mistake than anything to do with the spice factor in the chili.

                  "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
                  Still A Customer."

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                  • #10
                    Quoth Jester View Post
                    Now I could be wrong, but that sound more like a cooking mistake than anything to do with the spice factor in the chili.
                    Well, supposedly, the pan had never actually burned. It was just the caustic stuff he was putting into it.

                    Again, I don't really know. I refuse to even try it. Probably a good thing. I doubt that Teflon is good to eat...


                    Eric the Grey
                    In memory of Dena - Don't Drink and Drive

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                    • #11
                      Well, the oven idea is clear out the window, since the large pot I am using to cook my double batch of chili (two cookoffs remember) is too tall to fit in the oven! So what I am doing is simmering the chili on low until I leave for work, then killing the heat but keeping the lid on the pot so the chili will continue to simmer for a while. When I get home in a few hours, I can continue the process.

                      I hope this works!

                      "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
                      Still A Customer."

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                      • #12
                        Quoth Evil Queen View Post
                        Sounds tasty Jester. What are you going to use to give the White Chili some kick?
                        peruvian white peppers?
                        EVE Online: 99% of the time you sit around waiting for something to happen, but that 1% of action is what hooks people like crack, you don't get interviewed by the BBC for a WoW raid.

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                        • #13
                          No no no no no. We want the white chili to have some kick, but not the kind that kicks you in the head, knocks you into the dirt, and makes you wonder why you even got out of be this morning.

                          So I was paranoid about leaving the burner on, and I left hoping that the residual heat in the lidded stock pot would continue to simmer my chili. But I was also paranoid that I would get home to a stone cold pot of chili going bad. I needn't have worried. After almost four hours of sitting on a stove that was off, the pot was still rather hot to the touch, and the chili in it is still very warm. I turned the heat on again, going to heat it up, turn off the heat, and go shopping with Cookie for the rest of our ingredients for the white seafood chili we're making. Then I'll come home, turn the heat back on, and simmer the chili in a somewhat more controlled way.

                          By the way, whoever said that the chili would be spicier without the beans....you were right! Holy shnikeys! That thing's got a good kick now! I used about the same spice profile as before, give or take, though I added a couple new wrinkles. I may need to go back and add some more of my sweet ingredients, for balance, but overall, so far I am liking it. A lot.

                          And as it turns out, it's probably a good thing logistically that I didn't add the beans. If I had, that would have been about four 1 lb. cans of beans added to the pot....and without them, the pot is already almost filled to the brim!

                          It's gonna be a FUN weekend!

                          "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
                          Still A Customer."

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                          • #14
                            I swear as the gods are my witness, the next time I have a chili cookoff, I am going to take a day OFF to cook the damn thing! Running around trying to get parts of it done and here and other parts there? Not. Fucking. Working.

                            Part of my problem is that I am not that great with prepping. It took me over THREE HOURS last night to cut up all the meats (sirloin steak, pork tenderloin, chorizo sausage) and veggies (serrano peppers, poblano peppers, habanero peppers, red bell peppers, white onion, garlic, cilantro). Then building the chili takes some time, and it really should simmer, something I haven't had the luxury of before, but I am damn well doing this time. Grr.

                            I would love next time to just devote an entire day to puttering about in the kitchen, cleaning as I go, not hurrying for anything I have to do, and doing it all in shorts and a t-shirt....or even pajama pants. I honestly can't wait until this weekend is OVER and I can just freakin' RELAX!

                            That being said, I am loving this. I can't wait for the weekend, as this is insane....two cookoffs in two days? Really? Fuck yeah!

                            "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
                            Still A Customer."

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