Green Chile Chili

There are many things I love about Colorado -- the mountains, the craft breweries, the skiing and hiking, the laid-back lifestyle -- but one of the things I love most is that you can order delicious, homemade green chile chili just about everywhere you go.

Whenever we're in Colorado -- and we're there a fair amount, with Nate being from Colorado and having plenty of family members there -- I'm always sure to order a cup or a bowl. The style I've had in Colorado always has pork in it and is very thick. It's often served over other foods, such as burritos. Yum!

Green chile chili is always something I've wanted to make and for some reason never did. Until now.

With the cool fall temps and changing leaves, I figured now would be a good time to make our first batch of chili of the season. Nate and I both consulted a few different green chile chili recipes for ideas and insight, and then came up with this recipe.

I have no idea how traditional it might be (I have a feeling it's not too traditional at all), but I can tell you this -- it was delicious, and we will definitely be making it again. It had just the right amount of heat for us (it might be a bit much for those who don't like things too spicy) and the pork and Great Northern beans made it very satisfying. 

Green Chile Chili

• 1.25(ish) pounds pork (I can't remember what we used, but shoulder or pork butt would work) 
• 4 Anaheim chiles
• 1 Poblano pepper
• 1 banana pepper
• 2 small red chiles
• 1/2 jar tomatillo salsa
• 1 can Great Northern beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 14.5 oz. can of diced tomatoes
• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 teas. ground black pepper
• 1 tsp. dried oregano
• 2 cups chicken broth
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• flour
• olive oil

Cut pork in about 1/2-inch to 1-inch pieces (you can cut it after cooking, too, which is sometimes easier). Dredge pork in flour. Heat olive oil -- about a tablespoon -- in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Cook pork until browned.

Meanwhile, turn oven broiler on high. Place peppers on a foil-lined baking sheet. broil peppers and chiles, other than the small red ones, until blackened, rotating as needed (I think this took me about 20 minutes total). The small red  ones were too small to broil, and ended up crispy. I would just chop those and throw them in with everything else. After the peppers are blackened, place in a plastic bag and seal for about 15 minutes. Peel skin off the peppers, de-seed if desired and chop. 

Add pork, peppers and rest of ingredients to a slowcooker. Cook all day on low (you could also do this on the stovetop for a few hours, but I like how flavorful soups/chilis get in the slowcooker). Serve with cornbread, shredded cheddar, tortilla chips or anything else you'd like.

I was so excited to eat this meal that I didn't take a picture of the finished product. But I'm sure you can imagine what it looked like!

Crockpot Curried Vegetables & "Rice"

I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again--I love crockpot recipes, and I especially like making them for Monday night dinner. This way, we usually have plenty of leftovers for lunches and even one dinner throughout the week.


This recipe for Curried Vegetables & Rice (I'll get to the rice part) jumped out at me while flipping through my Biggest Book of Slow Cooker Recipes. I love anything with curry, and I wanted to find a vegetarian recipe.


The recipe was super easy and had lots of great, tasty stuff in it. That being said, there are a few things I would do differently next time.





Curried Vegetables

• 3 medium potatoes, cut into 1/2-in. chunks (3 cups)


• 4 medium carrots, cut into 1/4-in. slices (2 cups)


• 1 large red onion, cut into strips (1 cup)


• 1.25 cups apple juice


• 2 Tbs. quick-cooking tapioca


• 2 teas. curry powder


• 1 teas. grated fresh ginger (I used a little less than a teaspoon of ground ginger)


• 1/2 teas. salt


• 1/2 teas. ground cardamom


• 1 12.3-oz. (or 14 oz., like I used) package extra-firm tofu, drained and cut into 3/4-in. cubes


• 1 medium zucchini, halved lengthwise and cut into 1/2-in. slices


• 1 cup frozen peas


• 1/3 cup golden raisins


• chutney (optional) (we used mango chutney)


• 1 cup rice uncooked

In a crockpot, combine ingredients from potatoes to cardamom.

Cover, cook on low for 8-10 hours or on high for 4-5 hours.

Cook rice according to package directions.

If cooking on low, turn to high heat setting. Add tofu, zucchini, peas and raisins to cooker. Cover and cook for 30 minutes more. Serve veggie mix over hot cooked rice and top with chutney.

There are two things I would do differently next time (and I would definitely make it again--it was very tasty and satisfying):

• I'd brown the tofu a bit first to create a better texture and seal in some flavors before putting it in the crockpot.


• The tofu wasn't as warm as we would have liked--cooking it a bit before would help this, but it would also help to cook everything on high for more like 45-60 minutes.

So, the rice ... Neither of us can make rice all that well on the stovetop, so we invested in a rice cooker a few years ago. It works really well and makes great rice. The problem is, is that Nate is usually the one who cooks it, and he was working late Monday night. So I had to make it. Long story short, the measurements didn't add up and the rice was crunchy and inedible. So instead of rice, we served the curry veggies with rice noodles I cooked. It was OK, but the rice noodle flavor was too overpowering. It would have been better with fewer noodles or just plain with no type of rice/noodle. Tonight's leftovers will be served over couscous, which I think will taste better.

CCC: Crockpot Chickpea Chili

In the same issue of Cooking Light that I found the shrimp pad Thai, I also found a recipe for Chickpea Chili in the crockpot. I had been looking for a vegetarian meal and something to put in the crockpot for a Monday night meal. Perfect!

The meal took some prep time, so don't think you can just throw a few things in the crockpot, all willy nilly, and be done with it. The recipe calls for dried chickpeas (although I supposed canned would be all right), which you have to let stand in boiling water for 1 hour. There is also a lot of chopping, as the recipe calls for butternut squash, onion and garlic. BUT, it's all worth it. This meal was delicious and hearty. And it makes a ton--we've had six servings of it, plus there are at least two, maybe three more, in the freezer.

We pretty much followed the recipe, but did a few things differently:

• Used veggie broth rather than chicken broth to make it fully vegetarian (and, honestly, I had veggie broth on hand!).


• I couldn't find golden raisins at Outpost, so we used regular (brown?) raisins.


• I didn't have fresh cilantro, but I had had some in the freezer, in ice-cube form, so I defrosted that and used it. I think fresh cilantro would be better, but alas.

The chili was great over the couscous, but I think it would be great just plain, too. The only thing I would do differently next time is make it spicy--the recipe calls for a bit of ground red pepper, but I'd add more or a jalapeno--something. Also, one thing to note--the recipe calls for pimiento-stuffed olives, which I love, but Nate doesn't like. We added them anyway, and he said they tasted just fine.

Slow-Cooked Pork Carnitas for Tacos

After I determined I wanted to make homemade tortillas, I needed to figure out what to put inside of them. I'd been thinking about making carnitas for a while, so that's what we went with. I thought a crockpot recipe would be best, as I knew we'd be busy making everything else from scratch and wouldn't be able to devote much of the stove top, or our time, to making the carnitas.

I found this recipe for slow-cooked pork carnitas on Outpost General Manager Pam Mehnert's blog, A Year of Inconvenience (for an entire year, Pam made everything she cooked at home from scratch--pretty crazy AND awesome). I followed the recipe exactly, except for one thing: I substituted chipotle powder for the ancho chile powder, since I had some in the spice cupboard.

The carnitas were great and perfect for our tacos (it doesn't appear that I took a picture of the finished product. Oops!). This would also be a good filling for tamales (another thing we plan to make sooner than later). Nate also put some leftovers on a sandwich. I'd definitely make the recipe again. Next time, though, I think I would bake the pork for a few minutes after taking it out of the crockpot to get that crispness carnitas usually have.

Crockpot Poblano Pork Stew

Monday was a crockpot night, and we turned to one of our favorite cookbooks, Biggest Book of Slow Cooker Recipes. We have a lot of meat in the basement freezer that we stopped on at the West Allis Farmer's Market this fall, so I wanted to use some of that. The recipe calls for boneless pork shoulder, but we used ground pork.

We followed the recipe fairly closely, but, of course, and some changes. Here's the recipe we followed:

Poblano Pork Stew

• 1 lb. ground pork, browned and drained
• 1.25 lb. red potatoes, cut in chunks (I'd recommend cutting on the small side)
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 poblano peppers cut into 1-inch pieces (we did not seed them)
• 1 jalapeno pepper, chopped (we did not see this either)
• about 1 teas. garlic powder (we ran out of fresh, otherwise I would have used four cloves)
• 2 inches stick cinnamon
• 3 cups vegetable broth
• 1 14.5 oz. diced tomatoes
• 1.5 cups corn
• 1 tbs. chili powder
• about 1 tbs. crushed dried parsley
• 1/4 teas. black pepper

In a crockpot, place potatoes, onions, peppers, garlic and cinnamon. Add meat.

In a bowl, combine broth, undrained tomatoes, chili powder, parsley and black pepper. Pour over all.

Cover and cook on low 8 to 10 hours (or on high for 4-5 hours). Discard cinnamon before eating.

We served the stew over leftover white basmati rice.

The stew had a nice kick to it with the poblano and jalapeno. It really could have used salt, though, and we added it as we ate it. It would be good with some regular salt or a good seasoning salt.

Super Bowl Eats: French Dips & Crispy Footballs

If you didn't know, the Super Bowl was this past Sunday and the Green Bay Packers won! Having the Packers in the Super Bowl was cause for a small celebration, so we invited my parents over, as well as our friend Craig and Margo.

Everyone provided great food--Margo and Craig brought little smokies two ways: in a tasty and slightly spicy sauce in the crockpot, as well as rolled in cresent dough and baked for a few minutes. My parents brought spinach dip, a beer cheese dip and one of my favorites, sesame potatoes (hashbrowns baked in sour cream, cream cheese and other deliciousness!).

For our part, Nate and I made crockpot French dip sandwiches. and I attempted to make mini Rice Krispy footballs (more about that later).

I had never made French dip sandwiches before, and franky, I'm not sure I've ever ordered one. But a few weeks ago, my coworker Val was talking about a tasty and easy crockpot recipe she had. I thought it would be perfect for a Packers gathering.

Here is the recipe I used, from Our Best Bites food blog. We followed it pretty closely, with a few additions:

-We used a 3 lb. rump roast, since we knew we were cooking for six people.

-We used just one cup of water and then a bottle of Nate's homebrew to give it some more flavor.

-For additional toppings, we sliced and sauteed onions, mushrooms and green pepper.

-Next time, I wouldn't add so much water. I'd pour the beer in, and if the meat is uncovered at all, I'd put some water in just to cover or mostly cover the meat.

We served the sandwiches (we topped them with provolone cheese) on fairly large, crusty sub rolls from Peter Sciortinos Bakery, and, of course, with a side of the au jus and my mom's potatoes. Yum!

Years ago, for a Super Bowl party, I had made Rice Krispy treats in the shape of footballs. I remember those being good, but not quite as flavorful as what I was looking for (and I couldn't find that recipe!). So I did some Googling and came across this recipe from About.com Cooking for Kids (should be easy enough, right?).

I had a helluva time making these things, and even vowed never to make Rice Krispy treats again (we'll see what happens!). They tasted really good, so that was good. But it was a mess trying to get the mixture out of the bowl when I was done and on to the wax paper. I formed the first few footballs fairly easily, but as the mixture started to harden, it was almost impossible--plus my hands were continously covered with the mixture.

So, I attempted to just stuff the mixture in a pie plate (why a pie plate, I don't know--I was desperate!). Then, I thought, well, maybe from the pie plate I could make football-type shapes by taking a chunk and shaping them. That worked ... OK. Some looked better than others. I was so frustrated by this point, that I didn't want to make any icing for lacing, but then as I looked at the treats some more, they looked really ridiculous without the lacing (not going to lie--they looked like turds!).

So I made some homemade icing, and, of course, I ran out of powered sugar! Nate was out and about later on and he picked up some more for me, so I could finally put the laces on them. Like I said they tasted pretty good (they had Nutella in them, after all!), but getting to that point was a bit of a mess! (And it looks like I didn't take a picture of the final product. Oops!)

Crockpost Chicken and Veggie Tikka Masala

I read this recipe for Chicken Tikka Masala in Outpost's e-newsletter a few weeks ago (it's housed on their recipes page) and thought it looked great. For whatever reason, however, I didn't save it and forgot all about it. Last week, a co-worker was talking about a crockpot Indian recipe she came across and sent it out--turns out it was the same one! (Fun fact: surveys have found that chicken tikka masala is the most popular dish in British restaurants. Another fun fact: I spent a semester in London when I was in college and never had Indian food. I'm ashamed of it now!)



The recipe calls for a lot of stuff, but it's really easy--and turns out splendidly. We did just a few things differently to work with what we had:

-Instead of 2 lbs. of chicken thighs, I used 1 chicken breast, 1 drained can of chickpeas and 4 small potatoes, peeled and cubed.
-I didn't use cilantro (didn't want to buy a huge bunch just for garnish).


-Instead of stringing the cardamom pods together or using cheesecloth, we used the tea infuser I have. (By the way, you can buy them at Spice House if you're looking for them!)



-We served the masala with naan instead of rice. Rice would have been good, but we didn't have enough time to make it and the naan only took about five minutes.



The only drawback to the whole thing is that I think it cooked a bit too long. I cooked it on low for 8 hours, but then it was on keep warm for almost another five hours (Monday was a late night for both of us!). It didn't have a burned flavor, but you could tell it had been cooking quite a while. Nonetheless, it was amazing and I can't wait to make it again. You can do a lot of different things with it--use all chicken, make it all vegetarian, or combine the both in a different way.

Sloppy Lentils in the Crockpot

I have my foodie friends over at Burp! blog to thank for this recipe. They wrote a blog post about it in early December, and from the moment I read it, I've been thinking about it ever since. Really, I have.

So, last Sunday, the opportunity to make a great crockpot recipe presented itself. We had plans to go to a local bar and watch the Packers game, so we put the recipe together and left it to cook all day (and it's a good thing we did--I ended up throwing my back out at the gym and was unable to be upright for the better part of the day).

It was excellent. The flavors were great, and it had just the right amount of spice. Here is the recipe. Even Nate, who always prefers meaty meals as opposed to these vegetarian meals, said he really liked it.

We followed the recipe exactly, except that I didn't read--until about two hours before we planned eat--that after cooking, I was supposed to let it cool, sit in the fridge overnight and then reheat the next day. Oops! I think it tasted great as it was.

We served the sloppy lentil sandwiches with one of our favorites, baked sweet potato fries. Everything was delicious!

Making it Up as I Go: Pot Roast

I was out of town last weekend, and Nate had to come up with some dinner ideas on his own. For Monday night dinner, he took a pork pot roast out of the freezer. We had bought it at the West Allis Farmer's Market a while ago from one of our favorite local, free-range meat vendors. We didn't follow a recipe--we just used what vegetables we had leftover from CSA boxes.

Here's what we did:

Crockpot Pot Roast and Vegetables

-1 pot roast (maybe three pounds? I forgot to look ...)

-1 potato, cubed

-3 carrots, peeled and chopped

-2 leeks, sliced

-3 beets, peeled and cubed

-3 small parsnips, peeled and cubed

-3 cloves garlic, sliced

-salt and pepper to taste

-1 bottle beer

-water

Place pork at bottom of crockpot. Cover with veggies. Pour bottle of beer over everything.

Pour in enough water to cover much of the vegetables. Season to taste. Cook all day on low.

That's it! It was very easy. It was pretty tasty--very hearty, filling and healthy. When it was done cooking, we took out the vegetables, put them in a separate bowl, and took the meat and separated it. This was, we got all of the flavors combined. We also scooped out some of the liquid and served it over the meat and veggies.

It's a nice way to use up any vegetables you need/want to get rid of. Next time, I would season it more--add some garlic powder, some more salt and pepper and maybe thyme, oregano and/or sage. We served it with some made-up Parmesan garlic bread on the side.

Crockpot Recipe: Easy Italian Chicken

Crockpot Mondays has become a weekly thing in our house. It's a nice, easy way to start out the week and always produces lots of leftovers, great for lunches and at least one dinner meal later in the week.

While consulting my go-to crockpot cookbook, Biggest Book of Slow Cooker Recipes, we found an easy and tasty-sounding recipe: Easy Italian Chicken. Plus, it called for cabbage, and we had a lot of it to use up from the CSA box.

We followed the recipe pretty closely. We did add about some green bell pepper, though. Here's the recipe/ (It made four servings)

Easy Italian Chicken

-1/2 of a medium head of cabbage, cut into wedges

-1 medium onion, sliced and separated into rings

-1 4.5-oz. jar of sliced mushrooms (I used fresh mushrooms)

-2 tbs. quick-cooking tapioca

-2-2.5 lbs meaty chicken pieces, skinned (we used three chicken breasts)

-2 cups meatless spaghetti sauce

-about 3/4 of a green bell pepper, sliced

-grated Parmesan cheese, to taste

In a crockpot, place cabbage wedges, onion, mushrooms and pepper. Sprinkle tapioca over vegetables. Place chicken pieces on vegetables. Pour sauce over chicken. (The crockpot was really, really full!)

Cover and cook on low heat for 6-7 hours or on high for 3-3.5 hours. When cooked, transfer to serving platter. Sprinkle with cheese.

We served the chicken just in a bowl (with a side salad). It would be pretty filling, but you could serve it with garlic bread or over noodles or polenta.

Homemade Sloppy Joes

I've always loved sloppy Joes. It's something my mom made quite a bit while I was growing up, and I always looked forward to those meals. Nate and I used to make sloppy Joes with Manwich, most of the time. While I love the taste of Manwich, I'm getting more and more into making things from scratch. Plus, the last time we made Manwich, I looked at the ingredients and the list is VERY long and contained some not-so-great-for-you things.

So, on Sunday, we had some friends over for the Packers-Vikings game and made sloppy Joes from my favorite crock pot cookbook, Biggest Book of Slowcooker Recipes. The recipe was super easy and it didn't take much to put together. It turned out to be a little soupier (sloppier?) than we had thought, but it's sloppy Joes, so it wasn't too surprising.

Here is the recipe:

Sloppy Joes

-2.5 lbs. ground beef (I ended up with about 2.75 lbs.)

-1 medium onion, chopped

-3 cloves garlic, minced

-1.25 cups ketchup

-1 medium green sweet pepper, chopped (I just used green bell pepper)

-2 stalks celery

-1/3 cup water

-3 tbs. each: brown sugar, prepared (yellow) mustard, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce

-1 tbs. chili powder

-I also added about 10 mushrooms, sliced

-buns or however you want to serve it

In a large skillet, cook ground beef, onion and garlic until meat is brown and onion is tender. Drain off fat.

In a slow cooker, combine all other ingredients (besides buns!). Stir in meat mixture.

Cover an cook on low for 6-8 hours or on high for 3-4 hours (we cooked on low for about 5.5 hours before turning to warm). Spoon into toasted buns.

In addition to the sloppy Joes, we made our signature sweet potato fries. Plus, with the rest of the cabbage I had left, made some simple coleslaw with carrots and slaw dressing.

Homemade Applesauce

We buy apples year round, but lately, since it's apple season, we seem to have lots and lots of extras. This past week, we had some leftover from the previous week's grocery trip, plus some from the farmer's market, some that were on sale at Outpost and some my dad picked up in La Crescent, MN (the apple capital of Minnesota!).

I knew we'd never be able to eat them all just raw, so I wanted to make something with them. I just so happened to get an Allrecipes.com newsletter in my e-mail inbox last week for slow cooker applesauce. Perfect!

I was also in luck that my mother-in-law was coming to visit for the weekend, and brought along her apple peeler/corer/slicer. Again, perfect!

Here is the recipe for spiced slow cooker applesauce. It's so simple and straight forward, I'll type out the recipe here.

-8 apples, peeled, cored and thinly sliced. I used all sorts of varieties of apples and all different sizes. I also then quartered the apple slices. I later learned this really wasn't necessary, since the apples just fell apart after cooking so long.

-1/2 cup water

-3/4 cup packed brown sugar

-1/2 teas. pumpkin pie spice (I used a little extra)

Combine apples and water in slow cooker. Cook for 6-8 hours on low (I cooked them about 7 hours). Stir in sugar and pumpkin pie spice, cook another 30 minutes.

I started this at noon on Sunday, and it was ready to have a small bowl with dinner at 7:30.

For a long time, it didn't look like there was enough liquid in the crockpot to make it into a sauce, but it turned out perfectly.

The taste was fantastic. I think next time I make it, I'll start with a little less brown sugar, and add more if needed. One of the comments on the Allrecipes.com page said they made the sauce with half pears and half apples. I might just have to try that, too!

Chili, Take Two

As I mentioned in this early March blog post, Nate and I came up with a chili recipe a while ago that we absolutely love. Everything about the recipe is really good, and we usually don't change much about it.

We made it last Monday for the Packers-Bears game. We while seemed to tweak it just a bit from our usual recipe, it tasted quite different. Not bad, but ... different.

The biggest change was that since we had so many fresh tomatoes, I used those instead of the two cans of tomatoes the recipe calls for. I grated all the tomatoes, like I did for this recipe, and threw it all in the crock pot.

I don't think I added a can of green chiles for whatever reason. I added one jalapeno, but other than that, didn't make it really spicy. We also added a bottle of Nate's Oktoberfest beer that is still carbonating.

Because the tomatoes were so juicy and liquidy, the chili turned out a bit more liquidy than usual. Usually the recipe is pretty thick, but this was more soupy. The taste was still good, but it wasn't quite as full-flavored as it usually is. I guess we'll stick to canned tomatoes from now on!

We also made cornbread muffins with the chili, using the same recipe I reference in the first chili blog post. I always like to make a big batch of them and freeze the leftovers for future meals.

Also, Ann brought a delicious cheese dip over to eat for an appetizer: Swiss walnut cracker snack recipe. Check out the recipe here. It was very tasty, and while it was served cold, we agreed it would be good baked for a while, too.