Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Burn Down the House Chili

I have been smelling something on fire the past couple of days. The boyfriend didn't smell it, even when I made him stand in the exact same spot as me in the kitchen. You see, I'm a little bit of a "super-smeller", and have been even when I was a smoker. It smelled like either a wood stove burning, or a barbeque pit, but only in one corner of the kitchen.
I forgot about it on Monday after verifying that there was no fire, but on Tuesday I was determined to find out what it was. Were my neighbors grilling something delicious? Maybe it was a wood stove, although the temperatures have been in the 70's. I stood in that one spot in the kitchen, and smelled everything, including the bamboo cutting board. Then I looked up. Eureka! Mr. Greens had bought a bunch of dried chili and peppers from Fresh Pickins this weekend, and the smell was seeping out of their bags. They smelled peppery, but also like wood smoke. I grabbed the bag and ran into the other room, "I'm not crazy!" I yelled.
We had chili tonight with these large dried peppers. I'm obviously not a pepper connoisseur, nor did I pick out the peppers. Mister made the chili with beef, diced tomatoes, bell pepper, dried peppers, beer, stock, red beans, kidney beans, and maybe a few secret ingredients. He was cooking by feel, but ended up being disappointed with his dish.I was not disappointed, and ate half of this bowl.Plus several pieces of cornbread. [Maybe 3 small pieces?]And....2 beers.














To rewind a bit, for breakfast I had steel cut oats with a teaspoon of brown sugar, walnuts, and raisins.
It was creamy and good. I added a dab of milk (maybe a tablespoon or two?) to help liquify it a bit. When I make a big batch and keep a few servings in the fridge, they tend to become rather gelatinous. Most of the milk seeped out of the container on the way to work.
Unfortunately I snacked on these a little bit:They really made my stomach hurt. I haven't had M&M's in awhile.
For lunch I had a sweet potato half (plain)
and black eyed peas. Oh yeah! I could've eaten about 3 servings of BEPs but I held back. A little bit later I munched on a few veggies from this tempting tray. Even had some hummus. Nice paprika dumpage.But I wasn't really hungry, so I stopped. I even brought out a pear and Zbar to be photographed but they didn't get eaten. I am not taking any victory laps for intuitive eating yet, I think it was the M&M's that killed my appetite for the rest of the day.
Right now I'm drinking a good decaf tea-Sweet Coconut thai chai. Sweet Dreams!

2 comments:

Elena said...

Hi Beans,
I can't imagine why Mr Greens was disappointed in the chili. It is gorgeous (although obviously a Yankee chili. Not that there's anything wrong with Yankees or their chili!)

beans said...

Don't tell anyone, but that's Yankee cornbread too. Southerners are supposed to like unsweetened cornbread, but not me! I'm a rebel.