A good chili recipe sometimes is hard to come by

A couple weeks ago, Dottie Gagne of Greenville asked for “any chili recipe as long as it is GOOD.” Nobody sent in a recipe, so I decided to go hunting for one. I asked people all around – at my bank, at a graduation party – and after a while I noticed the general drift of conversation went something like this: “Well, I don’t really have a recipe for chili,” and, “Oh, I just use one of those chili kits,” the kind with alarming names on them. So it wasn’t an excess of modesty that prevented a deluge of favorite family chili recipes, it’s just that good old seat-of-the-pants cooking most of us do before hungry people show up looking for supper.

But I remembered an awfully good chili I ate at my friend Leslie Fuller’s Cushing home. I arrived shortly after she got home from work, and she assembled it while her husband, Ben, several cats and I milled around the kitchen. It was richly flavored and satisfying and I remember thinking, “Gosh, this is good. How come I don’t make chili more often?”

How come, indeed. What with moose meat gifts and venison in the freezer, plus the canned beans and tomato sauce I usually have on hand, the ingredients are always around. I am way too much of a cheapskate to let someone else measure out my spices for me and stick them in little packets, and since I can buy bulk spices at the local co-op, it is easy to keep an ample supply of chili powder and cumin around.

So I called Leslie and asked for her recipe. Secrets, if any, include using beans of two color (black beans and kidney beans or light kidneys and dark red kidneys), and always draining them, then adding sugar and a squirt of ketchup. She prefers using cut up beef chuck but will use ground meat. She says it is better when you soak the beans yourself and then use a Crock-Pot because canned beans fall apart easily if you cook them too long. Leslie said to add “heat to taste, sometimes I use hot sauce.” Start with the amount specified below, then add more gradually until it is where you like it.

I put some chili in the freezer in small containers so the next time we cook hot dogs on the grill, I can have a chili dog. Good on rice or with cornbread.

Looking for…

Kathy Schneider from Lincoln, wrote to say: “My husband’s grandmother made a delicious Oyster Pie – it had two crusts, oysters, potatoes, and hard boiled eggs. Ever heard of any recipes like this?” She has looked in lots of recipe books, and now we’d like you to look in your recipe boxes for this one.

Send queries or answers to Sandy Oliver, 1061 Main Road, Islesboro 04848. E-mail: tastebuds@prexar.com. For recipes, tell us where they came from. List ingredients, specify number of servings and do not abbreviate measurements. Include name, address and daytime phone number.

Leslie’s Chili

1 onion, chopped

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 tablespoon cooking oil

1 pound lean ground meat

2 cans (around 15 ounces each) canned kidney or black beans

1 large can (around 29 ounces) tomato sauce

1/4 cup of sugar

1 tablespoon of chili powder

1 tablespoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon cayenne

A squirt of ketchup

Brown the onion and garlic in the oil in a large heavy pan. Add the meat and brown it, then add all the rest of the ingredients and cook for half an hour or so. Taste occasionally and adjust seasoning. It’s always better the next day.