Posted on 02/13/2014 4:00:26 PM PST by nickcarraway
Chili tastes are highly personal, often inflexible and loaded with preconceptions — the political party of culinary offerings.
For some people raised in Texas, the notion of beans is akin to cat food, dismissed with derision as filler. Some chili cooks believe flavor rises and falls on cumin levels; others say the story begins and ends with dried chiles. Some like a rich beefy stock, and there are those who extol the entanglement of bacon.
Poultry and venison have their place (beef purists blanch), and vegetarian chili is met largely with guffaws except by the people who smilingly bring it to potlucks, an act that seems to stem from their childhood issues often associated with snack cake deprivation.
Serving rituals vary.
Oyster crackers on the side? Some have never heard of it, but maybe. Rice? Often! My Texan mother-in-law always served chili over spaghetti, a bit of Cincinnati craziness that confused and unnerved me, but I am perfectly at peace with chili dumped over a bag of corn chips, known as Frito pie. (Some regions refer to this as a “walking taco,” but I would prefer you do not.)
Yet just as much of our nation craves bipartisanship on the major policy debate of the day, so, too, do many chili lovers wish to end the crazy decades of rivalries. They believe it is time for us to embrace every form of this warming bowl of red soul food, be it venison-laced, processed cheese-topped, bean-adorned, beer laced, spicy or mild. My husband has even learned to live with beans. He just does not discuss it.
“I don’t disagree with anyone’s chili,” said Robb Walsh, a Texas food historian, the author of “The Tex-Mex Cookbook” and a restaurateur.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Funny you should say that. In the rural area where I grew up, it is somewhat customary to serve chili with "lettuce sandwiches." White bread, lettuce, Miracle Whip or Mayo on one side, and butter on the other.
I love it; drives my husband crazy...LOL!
Yep - and I think the cumin has to be just right for base flavor - once it's right, it can be spiced to taste.
It has to be in a vacuum bag, which doesn’t transmit any taste to the meat at all, as far as I can tell. Vacuum bags have to withstand both freezing and hot water temperatures without breaking down or even losing their seal, so are both thicker gauge and chemically tougher than most plastics.
More info:
http://nomnompaleo.com/post/12463202060/cooking-sous-vide-plastic-safety
“...there are some bags on the market that are indeed safe for sous vide purposes, and pose no problems from a BPA or EA perspective. The key is to stick with vacuum bags that are free of BPA, phthalates, and other plasticizers. It’s the plasticizers — chemical additives like phthalates that increase the pliability and fluidity of the plastic — that contain EA.
“I was able to confirm, for example, that Jarden’s FoodSaver bags are made from polyethylene glycol and nylon, and don’t contain BPA, phthalates, or other plasticizers with EA-leaching additives.
“The temperatures of sous vide are also low (polyethylene doesn’t begin softening until 195F), although I would imagine that a very small amount of polyethylene would still make it onto the surface of your food through diffusion. Polyethylene, however, is considered biologically inert, and scientists have been unable to detect any toxicity in animal tests (unlike BPA). It passes the Ames test and other studies of damage to DNA, and doesn’t have a similarity to estrogen.”
(The article continues with some debate.)
This calls for experiment. It might also help to bloom your spices first.
However, the part about adding the cooked and seared meat to the chili just to warm it before serving still holds. I imagine it like cooked shrimp dishes where you do the same, to avoid overcooking and toughening the shrimp.
My own unusual experience was in using Sous-Vide for cooking a large amount of stew beef, that wasn’t then seared, and using it in recipes where before I had pressure cooked or browned it, specifically beef goulash, Stroganoff and bœuf Bourguignon.
It is true that restaurant cut steaks are actually less flavorful than are the cheaper cuts, that really shine with Sous-Vide.
And now that I’m thinking about it, I wonder how the exotic spice blends would work with Sous-Vide:
Adobo
Argentinian Chimichurri
Berbere
Indonesian Bumbu
Chipotle Seasoning
(various) citrus peppers
Greek Seasoning
etc.
Chile is a country: Chili is a food. Simple, yes?
Yes, simple ;) Except, in New Mexico they call the chile that they grow, cook and hang by their doors *chiles*.
Then shame on them! LOL! Chileans won’t like that and for sure won’t understand it!
“Then shame on them! LOL!”
New Mexicans have been hanging chiles a lot longer than Chileans have existed. Chilis so good, they copied our name.
Well. I stand corrected...It’s still Chile and chili to me, since some of my folks are from Old Mexico... ;o]
There was a time when immigration when south from here instead of north from there.
I sure agree with that! Lots of folks focus exclusively on the chilies and powder, but getting the cumin right is the key.
“My favorite are the Chimayo chilis.”
Wow, you brought a tear to my eye and memories of home. My family has been chili farming in the Rio Grande Valley as far back as anyone remembers. We hail from the Los Lunas area near Isleta. I agree that Chimayo chilis are among the best in the world (it must be all that sacred dirt from the Santuario). With all due respect to Texas and their 2nd best chilis, New Mexican chilis in general have a distinctive flavor and uniqueness that is the taste of the southwest. If it ain’t New Mexican, it ain’t chit. lol
The chauvinism of the judges - nothing more, nothing less. How can you really tell if it's good chili ? It tastes good when you eat it, and doesn't give you gas.
And as a 31 year naturalized Texan, I use both ground meat and two kinds of beans.
Horsepuckey. There ain't no such thing. And you CAN win cookoffs using ground meat. I've won two using a combination of ground beef, turkey burger and pork sausage.
Of course, if it's a cookoff with rules thought up by an "eggspurt", or a consensus of officious clowns, there may be all kinds of idiotic requirements.
That's why they come to New Mexico to see a mountain.
Yup.
Blasphemy.
You make chile from porcines or bovines.
No exceptions.
Love it! Only, this native Texan loves chili/chile and was born on the side of the mountain where the sun rises ;p
Call one of them and ask them how to spell it.
It's "chile".
I checked, it’s spelt, D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!
I mean, really, all you got is one mispelled word as your contribution?
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