Entered on 02 October 2002 at 8:58 a.m..
The great chili search
The newbies begin arriving today, and so let the festivities begin. In particular this weekend is an international food event, which I have decided to participate in. It was suggested to me that I try to find some soup-like dish because it seems to be easiest to make in large batches and goes pretty far. So the first dish that came to my mind was chili. The only catch is that I am not particularly fond of most types of chili, with one notable exception. A former priest of mine, wife made the best, Karen-compatable chili. And in my naturally stuborn way I have spent the past two days trying to track him, her, the recipe down. It all culminated last night with me calling the church senior warden in a vain effort to catch the recipe before it disapeared with its owners on vacation for a week. To my (and the warden's) dismay we discovered that not only didn't she have any of the priest's contact information for the weekend, but she didn't even have his home phone number.
Luckily for me, the priest had promised to email the warden his contact information, and upon opening up his email he got the one I sent him last weekend, and responded with the recipe. So now I am the proud owner of a very-good chili recipe, however the challenge has just begun. I now begin my quest to actually find all of the ingredients I need. I have a few questions for members of the audience. Do you have any idea what is/ and if you know it by any other name:
celery seed
Also do you know the difference between: cayenne pepper, crushed cumin, and chili powder. I've never encountered cumin in any form other than powder. I'm also assuming that the cayenne pepper is also a powder.
It should be an adventure :) As always any advice will be greatly appreciated. I'm borrowing a crockpot on Friday, and will hopefully make up most of the chili that night and finish it off just before time on Saturday.
In other news, I saw the resident hedgehog last night as I was doing laundry. He is a little shy, and often toddles away when he hears me.