Baby it's cold outside

It's usually around this time that I start to bring out my autumn recipes. The sweet smell of rotting leaves, the bite in the air, the mounds of apples in every market and grocery store...I start bringing out the stuffed apples, the gingerbread, and anything with cinnamon in it. But one of my heartier meals that I do quite often is chili (see what I did there?).

Mom really would only do chili every once and a while. I'd have it in college, but no one really likes their cafeteria. It wasn't until I started living with Lou that I began to really appreciate it. She never worked Mondays, so it was usually on those days that I would come home from work, exhausted and not wanting to cook, and find the house smelling sharp and red. Lou's chili was always simple and easy to replicate...beef (or turkey), red kidney beans, black beans, garbanzo beans, tomato soup, chili powder.

When Lou moved back to the West coast, I took up her recipe. I added my own touches...cumin, red pepper flakes, garlic, diced onion, cilantro, crushed tomatoes. Eventually, I cut down the bean count from three to two after Virginia at work saw my chili lunch and her only response was "Wow, that's a lot of beans..." instead of the usual "Ooh, that looks good."

Recently, I had dinner with Karen and Michael with Kelly making his chili. The wine was served, of course, and then Kelly went to work. As I chatted with Karen about going back after maternity leave, I watched him add the usual fare with tomato paste, cheese rinds, pork stock, chicken stock, beef stock, sausage, the baby...but it was Michael's addition that caught my attention. After cleaning them, he chops up a few large potatoes and roasts them in the oven. Once they had a cracked, crisp skin, Kelly makes a bed of potatoes in each of the bowls. It is one of the best batches I have ever eaten. I wonder why I haven't thought of doing this a long, long time ago.