This is a pretty basic salsa recipe (adapted from this one I found on Epicurious and easily customizable to your favorite tomato type or heat tolerance. I used a combination of yellow and cherry tomatoes because that’s what I have on hand and I encourage you to experiment with your own favorite tomato/pepper combinations.

Ingredients

• 2 medium-sized tomatoes
• 1 cowhorn pepper
• 12-15 sprigs of cilantro
• 1 large garlic clove
• 1 small onion
• juice of a half a lemon
• Salt to taste

Preparation

1. Chop the tomatoes and onions and add them to a bowl. I chop them coarsely but, depending on your onion tolerability, you may want to chop them finely.
2. Chop the garlic, the pepper(s) and the cilantro finely and add to the onions and tomatoes. Add lemon juice and salt and stir till well blended.
3. For maximum raw onion kick, serve immediately. For maximum flavor blending, let the salsa sit covered overnight in the refrigerator.

Postprandial Notes: I also made a batch of guacamole, substituting a cowhorn for two jalapeños. Here it is slathered all over a freshly grilled burger. Yum.

So I decided to make chili. Now, before I get started on a rant about chili and especially the horrendous state of chili in DC, let me just state that 8 years of living in Texas have quite heavily influenced what I expect chili to taste like: rich, dense, layered and spicy. In fact, the spicier, the better.

Obligatory Chili Rant: Apologies to the President but what they serve at Ben’s Chili Bowl is not chili. It’s so far from what chili should be that, if chili got together and had a family reunion, BCB chili would not be allowed in the family picture.

The inspiration for this chili came from this recipe I found on Epicurious – I modified it quite a bit, upping the amount of seasoning, reducing the amount of meat, changing the type of beans and adding mushrooms and soy sauce. (For slightly more hoity-toity variation, you could also use red wine in place of soy sauce or, if you’re feeling particularly boozy, you can omit both the soy sauce and the broth and just use beer.) And, of course, substituting fresh yellow tomatoes for boring ol’ canned red ones.

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon cooking oil
• 3 large onions chopped
• 2-3 jalapeños, seeded and chopped
• 1 head of garlic (about 8 small cloves), chopped fine
• 2 pounds ground beef
• 1/2 cup chili powder
• 4 tablespoons ground cumin
• 2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 10-12 baseball-sized yellow tomatoes
• 1/2 pound of brown mushrooms
• 1/2 cup dried pinto beans (or 1 can prepared beans)
• 1/2 cup dried black beans (or 1 can prepared beans)
• 3 cups of beef or chicken broth
• 1 tbsp of soy sauce
• salt and pepper
• favorite toppings: sour cream, grated cheddar cheese, saltines, bread, tortilla chips, chopped cilantro, etc.

Preparation

1. If using dried beans, place beans in a pot and cover with double the amount of water. Bring to a boil and let boil for 5 minutes. Cover, turn down heat to low and simmer until beans are cooked for two hours, checking periodically to check water levels. Add water as needed. Set aside.
2. Chop onions, tomatoes, and mushrooms coarsely. Remove seeds and ribs from jalapeños and chop finely. Peel garlic and chop finely. Heat oil in a sautepan and saute onions until semi-translucent. Add garlic and jalapeños and saute for 2 minutes. Add beef and brown well, breaking up any stubborn clumps with a fork.
3. Throw in tomatoes, mushrooms, beans, spices and broth. Mix thoroughly and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for around an hour, until chili starts to thicken. Ideally, let the chili set for a day before serving to let the flavors chill out and mingle.
4. Serve topped with your favorite stuff.

Postprandial Notes: I actually made both a vegetarian and a meat version of the chili for a Social Justice Camp planning meeting. This round, I merely omitted the meat but in the future, I will increase the amount of mushrooms and probably include kidney beans for greater bean variety.

Ingredients

• 2.5 pounds pork shoulder or butt, cut into 1/2″ cubes and trimmed of most fat
• 4 cups Red Chile Sauce
• 1 small acorn squash
• Sour cream

Preparation

1. Marinate the meat in the sauce fo 24-48 hours, stirring occasionally.
2. Preheat oven to 350°. Bring the marinated mixture to a boil and then transfer immediately to the oven. Bake, covered for 2 hours
3. Cut squash in half and scoop out the seeds. Cut pointed end flat. Steam in a covered pan until flesh is tender. Place cooked squash on plates, cavity-side up. Fill with carne adobada. Spoon sour cream generously over the top. Sprinkle with cayenne pepper to make it look pretty.

Postprandial Notes: Carne adobada is incredibly flexible – we’ve been eating it with tortillas, wrapped in raw kale leaves, cooked with grits and just by itself. It is also incredibly spicy. Expect to sweat while you are eating it.

“I haven’t been cooking as much recently as I would like to (and perhaps even as much as I should), so this evening was a real treat. I tend to take my time cooking – carefully chopping and lining up the ingredients so that they can combine to maximize their flavor potential. Of course, I don’t really know what I’m doing but it usually works out.

Tonight’s recipe is a perfect example of mis-judging the amount of spice required for the dish. When I first started cooking, I would occasionally do this with salt – that is a hard-learned lesson, and I haven’t done that in a LOOOOOONG time (knock on wood!). See if you can pick out the spice that I was overly exuberant with this evening.

The name for this dish comes from its inspiration. I was looking at what we had to work with and was vaguely reminded of my favorite New Mexican squash dish: Tecalote Squash. This is clearly not the same, but it does allude to it, so I carried that through in the naming convention.

Enjoy!

Ingredients

• bacon fat
• 1 med white onion, chopped
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• freshly ground yummy salt
• freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 bottle cayenne pepper
• a touch of cumin
• 2 lg pieces of bacon, cooked, sliced into strips
• 1 chicken leg and thigh, painfully skinned, deboned, and cut into bite-size chunks by someone inept
• kernels removed from 1 ear of sweet corn
• 1/2 purple pepper, chopped
• 1.75 small heirloomy tomatoes
• 2/3 cup black beans

Preparation

1. Heat the bacon fat over med-high heat in a skillet.
2. Saute the onions and garlic for about a minute. Turn up the heat.
3. Add the chicken and let brown for a minute.
4. Add salt and pepper, cayenne and cumin – keep it moving!
5. Lower the heat to medium and add the bacon. Give it a minute.
6. Follow with the corn, pepper, and tomatoes and a little more salt and pepper. Stir it around nice. Give it a minute.
7. Add the black beans and turn the heat back up to med-high to really get things cooking!
8. Once they are, lower the heat again and let it simmer away until the peppers are done.
9. Serve with tortillas and some sort of dairy because “Holy mother of God! I added too much Cayenne!!” (you can tell because Chris hiccups)

It’s still yummy, though – Chris said so.”

• 1 cup black beans
• half an onion, finely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, grated
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 1 tbsp cumin
• 1 tsp oregano
• salt and pepper, to taste
• optional: lemon juice
• your favorite taco toppings

Preparation

1. Soak the beans overnight. Bring them to a boil and simmer until soft.
2. Drain liquid, retaining some. In a skillet or frying pan, heat cooking oil and saute onion until translucent. Add beans, garlic and spices and 1/2 cup of the bean liquid. Saute until most of the liquid is absorbed. Turn off heat, sprinkle with lemon juice if so desired.
3. Heat tortillas. Heap with beans, shredded lettuce or cabbage, tomatoes, pico de gallo, salsa, sour cream, cheese, etc. Enjoy with lots of napkins.