The Real Deal Chili Meal

The White Chili I made a while back was surprisingly good, but not good enough to avoid making the real deal some time this year. There's just something about the combination of meat and beans that is unbeatable. Chili is no exception. Chili also makes a smooth transition from omnivorous favorite to vegetarian comfort food. Whenever I make vegetarian chili, I always use this same recipe except add oatmeal to take the place of ground beef. It sounds a little odd, but the oatmeal really helps to thicken it and clumps similar to chunks of ground beef.

The Beef Chili turned out perfectly. It is such a simple base recipe that you could make numerous additions to suit your palette. Of course, you can adjust the amount of peppers to vary the heat as well, or omit them altogether. You could also substitute the chili peppers for chipotles and add some grilled steak for a smokier chili.

Chili is great, but chili in a bread bowl is so much better, so I made Cheese Bread bowls that turned out to be much larger than I had anticipated, so the bowl was actually big enough for 2… or three or four. Chili isn't exactly a romantic dinner, especially with the aftermath toots from the kidney beans and peppers, but it was fun to share. The bread was absolutely awesome though and if it were smaller would've made the perfect bread bowl. I think Shannon ate a loaf within the last 24 hours. I had just pulled them out of the oven before I had to go to work and I told her she could eat some if she wanted to. When I called her later on in the evening she said it was so good she wanted more. When I got off work half of it was gone and she said she spent 15 minutes starring at it after our phone call, contemplating whether she was going to finish it. Yes, it's that good. The chunks of cheesy goodness really made it. I miss making bread.