Take the chill off spring with a special chili

Somehow, I’ve managed to write this blog for four years, and I’ve never shared the recipe for Cincinnati-style chili. How could that be?

This unique chili brings back great memories of living in Ohio in the early ’90s. Competing quick-serve restaurants Skyline Chili and Gold Star Chili serve this tasty treat at location primarily in Ohio and Kentucky. I indulge in a bowl whenever I’m near there.

What makes it special is the spices. This chili has no beans but includes cinnamon and unsweetened chocolate. Honestly, the flavor probably isn’t what appeals to me — it’s the presentation. The “soup” (which is more of a sauce) tops a pile of spaghetti noodles and a huge pile of finely shredded cheddar cheese tops the whole concoction, and who doesn’t like cheese? Former Minnesotans certainly do.

I warmed up with Cincinnati-Style Chili on this kind of chilly spring day (sooo tired of this weather, but I hear we’re in for a warmup this weekend). When you make Cincinnati-Style Chili at home, you can serve it with a beer (the franchises in the Cincinnati area don’t have liquor licenses, though in my decades-ago experience, college kids like Cincinnati-style chili after hitting the bars). And I used gluten-free quinoa noodles.

Don’t let the long list of ingredients stop you from trying this recipe. It’s delish.

Cincinnati-Style Chili

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 yellow onion, chopped fine
• 1 pound ground beef
• 1 15-ounce can tomato sauce
• 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
• 2 tablespoons chili powder (I used 1 tablespoon mild, 1 tablespoon hot)
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1 bay leaf
• 1-1/2 teaspoons beef bullion
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
• 1/2 ounce square unsweetened chocolate
• 8 ounces spaghetti
• For topping: finely shredded cheddar cheese and chopped white onions

Directions:

1. Saute onion in oil in large saucepan over medium heat.
2. Add beef to brown, breaking up into small pieces.
3. Add wet ingredients. Add spices and chocolate. Stir to mix well. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer for at least an hour.
4. Meanwhile, prepare spaghetti noodles. To serve, remove bay leaf from chili. Mound spaghetti in low bowl. Top with generous portion of chili, then cheese (also generously) and onions. This is called 4-way (spaghetti + chili + cheese + onions). Really die-hards add beans for 5-way. Serves 2-4.

Beets won’t kill anyone; in fact, they’re pretty good in a salad

Beets are served rarely at Minnesota Transplant’s house. Close to never.

My Beloved doesn’t like beets.

But the pretty bunch of beets I saw at the farmer’s market recently beckoned to me. So I bought them. Over much protestation from my Beloved. Who exacted the promise from me that I wouldn’t serve them to him.

Fine then. I’ll eat them.

So I tossed them with a bit of olive oil and salt, roasted them up for about 30 minutes in a 400-degree oven and made this delicious salad. If you like beets, you might like it, too. And if not, well, I won’t make you eat it.

Roasted Beet Salad

Roasted Beet Salad

Ingredients:

• 3 or 4 medium beets, cut into quarters and roasted
• 2 cups romaine, chopped
• 1 green onion, sliced
• about 8 pecan halves, toasted
• 3 tablespoons blue cheese, crumbled
• juice of 1 lemon
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon mustard

Instructions:

1. While beets are roasting, prepare dressing by whisking together lemon juice, olive oil and mustard. Add salt and pepper to taste.
2. Assemble romaine, onion, pecans and blue cheese on plate. Top with  warm roasted beets. Drizzle with dressing. Serves 1.

Shield your eyes, calorie watchers

Buffalo Chicken Dip

Here’s a way to enjoy the commercials during the Super Bowl. Get the recipe, here.

 

A dish to share

If you need an impressive dish to pass for your next potluck, try this recipe for Salted Pretzel-Marshmallow Bars.

I believe the best potluck dishes are ones that are filled with decadent ingredients (like this one) or ones you’ll definitely eat yourself. I “settled” for decadent ingredients today, and my dish was a hit: I didn’t take any home. (Bonus: I got the recipe out of one of Food Network magazines from last summer, part of my 2013 project to cull my magazine rack.)

These yummy bars were the dessert to this, so I couldn’t go very far wrong:

Yum!

Round out the old year with clean-out-the-fridge soup

If “clean-out-the-fridge soup” makes you think of a stew with corn and okra and kidney beans, you’re not making it with stuff from my fridge.

My fridge is a strange composition of good-for-you veggies, condiments and cheese. A lot of cheese.

I live way too close to Wisconsin, me thinks.

Anyway, cheese is a great accompaniment to soup.

Today’s clean-out-the-fridge soup was made with:

• Nearly a head of wilted celery.
• A container of sliced white mushrooms.
• Three carrots.
• A wrinkly green pepper.
• Fresh ginger (peeled and sliced).
• An onion and a potato (from the pantry).

Saute half the mushrooms in olive oil and remove from pot. Chop all vegetables and saute in more olive oil. I would have added a few cloves of fresh garlic, but I couldn’t find it when I was sauteing (it was hidden by some cheese). Add a couple cups of water and bouillon cubes (or chicken stock) and simmer for 30 minutes. Add a generous tablespoon of dried parsley and pepper.

Transfer hot mess to a blender and blend until smooth. Add back to pot. Add sautéed mushrooms and season to taste. I added a little brown sugar (too much celery made my concoction a bit tart). I also found some apple butter and red curry paste. The red curry paste was inspired — it added a note of spicy hot to the bowl.

Now serve with a dollop of sour cream and pumpkin seeds (and on the side, cheese; don’t forget the cheese). Delicious!

Now you’ll feel healthier and your refrigerator will be one step closer to clean.

Oven-dried cherry tomatoes

Since there is no such thing as too many fresh cherry tomatoes, I’ve gotten creative on how to use them: By themselves, in salads, with cottage cheese, with shrimp over polenta, with pork tenderloin over polenta, in frittatas, with pesto gouda, crackers and red wine …

Despite eating them three times a day, I had a lot of cherry tomatoes left to consume. Here’s a new way to preserve them: Oven dried.

Here’s how they look, before and after:

Before: Fresh cherry tomatoes.

After: Dried cherry tomatoes.

There are a lot of versions of this online. Here’s how I did it.

Oven-dried Cherry Tomatoes

Ingredients:

• 4-6 cups cherry tomatoes
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Line a large baking sheet with foil.
2. Cut tomatoes in half and arrange side-by-side on baking sheet. Sprinkle with salt.
3. Bake in the oven for 3 hours (avoid opening the door repeatedly). Turn off oven and let sit until cool.
4. Store them in a sealed bag in the fridge. Serve on salads, pizza or pasta.

Pesto pizza with oven-dried tomatoes.

Zesty pesto

The weather finally broke late this afternoon.

When I went grocery shopping at noon, the thermometer in the car read 101 degrees. About 4 p.m., 10 drops of rain fell on the deck while a front rolled through, so I quick picked some basil and mint, preparing for nature’s fury. It never came, but the temperature dropped 20 degrees, and I made pesto for the turkey-and-Swiss sandwiches we had for supper.

It’s an oldie I’ve shared in this space before, but it’s good enough to share again. The mint and the lemon keep the pesto bright and green. Enjoy — the pesto and the weather.

Basil-Mint Pesto

Ingredients:

• 2 cups basil leaves, stems removed
• 2 cups mint leaves, stems removed
• ½ lemon, juice and zest
• ¼ cup pine nuts or almonds
• 3-5 cloves of garlic
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil or more if needed
• ½ cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Roast garlic if you’d like, and toast the pine nuts (10 minutes in a 350-degree oven).
2. Using a food processor, finely chop the basil, mint and garlic. Add lemon juice, lemon zest, Parmesan cheese and pine nuts or almonds and pulse into a course paste. With the machine on, slowly add the olive oil until incorporated. Season with salt and pepper.

Makes a rounded cup.

Passion for rambutan fades (but fruit salad is nice!)

“After we had conducted thousands of experiments on a certain project without solving the problem, one of my associates … expressed discouragement and disgust over our having failed to find out anything. I cheerily assured him that we had learned something. For we had learned for a certainty that the thing couldn’t be done that way, and that we would have to try some other way.”

~ Thomas Edison, American inventor

On the premise that no experiment is a failure (because even a failure proves something doesn’t work), I can hereby declare my exotic fruit experiment a rousing success.

But I don’t recommend you go out a buy rambutan.

I visited an impressive grocery store earlier this week with an amazing array of produce. I was reminded of grocery shopping with my mother-in-law when we were in south Texas, where the options were quite different from the ones we encountered at our standard Illinois supermarkets; she proposed buying something we’d never tried before on every trip. We ended up trying yucca root, cactus leaves, jicama, star fruit and kumquats, among other strange (to us) foods.

So on this expedition to a new store earlier this week, I invested in what I thought was a purple passion fruit — it was actually a rambutan — because I’d never eaten one before.

Here’s what a beauteous rambutan looks like:

It’s a hairy pit.

I bought only one since they cost, ahem, $2.75 each.

Upon returning to Google, I discovered there’s very little one can do with a single rambutan beyond eating the pulp in about two (small) bites. But I did find a recipe for passion fruit vinaigrette (because, remember, I thought it was a passion fruit), so I created a fancy luncheon salad based on a recipe I found a Recipes2all.com.

Here’s what I learned with my rambutan experiment:

1. Rambutan tastes a little like a baked apple (minus the sugar and cinnamon) with hints of creaminess and citrus.
2. They’re a bit of a pain in the neck to prepare (cut in half, remove seed(s), capture pulp and juice and end up with maybe a tablespoon of substance).
3. At $2.75 a piece, it’s an interesting experiment but not worth adding to the regular rotation.
4. Fruit salads are delicious! Adding blueberries (or strawberries or oranges or grapefruit or even dried cranberries) add sophistication and variety to plain old lettuce. I need to add more fruit to my greens!

If you’re interested in an experiment, here’s the recipe. Feel free to substitute some other vinaigrette for the rambutan version, and you’ll still enjoy the salad.

Fruity Salad with Rambutan Dressing

Ingredients:

• Romaine lettuce, ribs removed and leaves torn
• 2/3 cup blueberries
• 2/3 cup orange cherry tomatoes (red would be good, too)
• 2/3 of a large cucumber, peeled and chopped
• A couple handfuls of watercress, toughest stems removed
• Optional: A couple of tablespoons of unsweetened coconut and a few golden raspberries

Dressing:

• Pulp from one rambutan, chopped plus juice
• 1 tablespoon white vinegar
• A pinch of sugar
• 1 teaspoon grainy Dijon mustard
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• Freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

1. Prepare dressing by combining dressing ingredients. Set aside.
2. Layer romaine, tomatoes, blueberries and cucumber on plate. Add a handful to watercress to eat plate and garnish with coconut and raspberries.
3. Spoon dressing over salad and serve immediately. Serves 2.

10 reasons to try plain yogurt

Think of “plain” as “versatile” instead of “boring” and you’ll be on you way to enjoying a healthy — yet still creamy — alternative to all kinds of high-fat options.

I’m so accustomed to eating plain yogurt now, I can barely stomach that super sweet stuff that is passed off as good for you.

Remember, “plain” doesn’t mean “vanilla.” Plain yogurt has no sugar and no flavoring; look for non-fat as opposed to low-fat or full fat. Make it even better by draining some of the whey (use a cheesecloth and let it sit a couple of hours in the fridge); you’ll end up with a thicker substance the consistency of Greek yogurt without the high price.

While it’s possible to eat it right out of the container, I don’t recommend it especially if you’ve never eaten it before. Here are 10 other reasons to try it:

1. Create your own flavored yogurt with chunks of fresh fruit. Add sugar or sweetener to taste. A six-ounce container of Yoplait Original Yogurt contains seven teaspoons of sugar! When you add your own sweetener, you’ll almost certainly use less.
2. Use plain yogurt as a non-fat substitute for mayonnaise in tuna salad, chicken salad, ham salad or macaroni salad. You’ll probably never taste the difference, and even if you use half mayo/half yogurt, you’ll save fat and calories. A tablespoon of plain yogurt has 8 calories while a tablespoon of light mayonnaise has 45.
3. Add ranch dressing mix for a delicious dip for fresh vegetables.
4. Use it as a substitute for sour cream in dips and on baked potatoes, eggs and tacos.
5. Plain yogurt makes a killer tzatziki sauce. Add finely diced cucumber, chopped garlic, olive oil, fresh lemon juice and fresh or dried dill. Great with gyros, of course, but also good as a spread for sandwiches and as a vegetable dip. Tzatziki sauce is also wonderful on Crispy Chickpea Pitas instead of just plain yogurt (click here for the recipe).
6. Use it as a substitute for cream cheese in dips and desserts (I recommend using a tested recipe when making this substitution; baking is more scientific than stove-top cooking).
7. Plain yogurt is a suitable non-fat extender for guacamole. Add a couple of dollops for every avocado.
8. Plain yogurt contains L. acidophilus yogurt cultures which promote good bacteria in your gut. Yup, you don’t need to spring for the pricier yogurt with the expensive ad campaign.
9. Use it as a non-fat substitute for vegetable oil in muffins and cakes.
10. Plain yogurt is a delicious and hearty topping on hot cereal like oatmeal or Malt-o-Meal topped with fresh strawberries, blueberries or applesauce.

Have other ideas? Please share. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

How-to day

How to clean the air conditioning unit on your 1983 Pace Arrow RV:

1. Weigh yourself. RV roofs aren’t load bearing, and unless you’re interested in a sun roof, thinner service technicians are preferred.
2. Pull a picnic table over to the ladder on your RV. Climb up.
3. While your husband makes small talk with the RV owner next door, remove the screws attaching the cover of air conditioning unit to the roof. Avoid sudden motions that may scare you into losing your balance.
4. Spray an ungodly amount of Formula 409 into the evaporator coils.
5. Interrupt husband long enough to throw water hose on to roof. Have him do it again when you miss it the first time. Spray off evaporator coils, carefully avoiding the mud puddles that develop in the area of your knees (and butt).
6. Replace cover, taking care to tighten screws enough so cover doesn’t fly off into oncoming traffic the next time you take the RV on the road.
7. Throw empty bottle of Formula 409 and hose off the roof. Carefully climb down.

How to reward yourself after cleaning air conditioning unit on 1983 Pace Arrow RV:

1. Visit friend with good taste. When she offers you fruity margaritas, accept offer.
2. Watch carefully as she combines the following in a high-powered blender: 1 can of frozen limeade, 1 pint of raspberries, 1 can of triple sec and tequila, a whole bunch of ice cubes. Blend.
3. Admire the pretty glasses into which she pours drinks.
4. Enjoy pretty pink margarita and friend’s good company.

Do not reverse order of air conditioner reconditioning and happy hour.