Recipe Share: Mom's Chili

Category: Whole Foods

This is the chili recipe I use whenever I make chili. It is adapted from someone else's recipe, but I've changed it and made it my own.

MOM'S CHILI

Ingredients:
2 lbs. ground beef
1 sweet onion, diced
1 green or red bell pepper, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 Tablespoon Worcestershire Sauce
1 Tablespoon chili powder
2 15-ounce cans kidney beans
2 16-ounce cans diced tomatoes
1 15 ounce can tomato sauce
1 6 ounce can tomato paste
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
shredded cheddar cheese
sour cream

Combine ground beef, onion, pepper and garlic in large pot. Cook ground beef, breaking beef into small pieces. (Onion, pepper and garlic cook while the beef browns.)

To the cooked ground beef add tomatoes, tomato sauce, kidney beans, tomato paste and cinnamon. Stir to mix completely. Bring to a simmer; cover pot and reduce heat. Simmer on lowest heat for two hours or more, stirring periodically.

Serve with sour cream and shredded cheddar cheese. My family likes to eat this served with corn bread and salad, though in a pinch the chili is a meal in itself. This chili can be bagged and frozen. It can be broken up into smaller servings, served over hot dogs (for chili dogs), over corn chips (with lettuce) for taco salad, etc. Our favorite!

Recipe Share: Nana's Carrot Cake

Bar none, this is currently my favorite cake! (And I'm a chocoholic!)

NANA's CARROT CAKE

Ingredients:

1½ cup oil                                                                              1 tsp. salt

2 cups sugar                                                                         2 tsp. cinnamon

4 large eggs                                                                          2 cups finely grated carrots

2 cups all purpose flour                                                   8¾ ounce can crushed pineapple

2 tsp. baking powder                                                        ½ cup chopped walnuts

1½ tsp. baking soda                                                           cream cheese frosting (recipe below)

Grease bottom and sides of three 9-inch round cake pans and dust with flour. Set aside..

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat first three ingredients together at medium speed with electric mixer until blended.

Combine dry ingredients together on a sheet of waxed paper.  Add gradually to wet mixture, in three or four portions, mixing after each addition until well blended. Scrape sides of bowl between additions to catch the flour that may stick to sides. Stir in carrot, pineapple and nuts. (Hard to find crushed pineapple in a small can anymore, so buy larger can. Drain of pineapple juice and measure out about 1 cup or less to use in this recipe.)

Pour batter evenly into the three cake pans. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. Test cakes for doneness and add time if needed by 5 minute increments, testing again for doneness. Cool in pans on wire racks for ten minutes, then turn out of pans onto wire racks to cool completely before icing.

Spread cream cheese frosting between layers and on top and sides of cake. Yield: 1 3-layer cake. Prep time 20 minutes (not including time to shred carrots); bake time 25 minutes.

Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:

1 cup butter, softened (2 sticks)

8 ounce package cream cheese, softened

16 ounces (about 3 cups) powdered sugar (sift if necessary)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed with an electric mixer until blended. Gradually add powdered sugar and vanilla, beating well. Yield: 4 cups. Covers 3-layer cake.