Chili, Chili, Chili

In my bout of domestic forth coming and for the sake of Heroes on HD, I've been making dinners on Monday night for me and BF. While the stroganoff could have won a prize, the chicken last week was a bit dry. This week it's chili - but he's got a different view than I do. He's more of a 4 alarm guy where I prefer just a zip. We'll see how it turns out! I made 1/2 the batch normally and 1/2 with tobasaco and green chili peppers, not to mention seasoning it up a bit with a tad more chili powder.

And because he's such a gentleman and eats even dry chicken saying it still tastes great - I'm bringing in the two batches to my official tester at work. I love making food for him because he's honest down to the punch. He'll tell me if the meat I used was too low-grade or if there's too much garlic (I'm a garlic nut).

So here's the recipe with my tweaks and I'll let you know tomorrow how it turned out ...

1 1lb Ground Beef (I bought angus ground beef and I like a heartier chili so I did 2 lbs)

1 Medium Onion (by the way, keeping your mouth shut does not prevent you from tearing contrary to the BF's advice)

2 Cans (10.75 oz each) Tomato Soup

1 Can (28 oz) Chopped Tomatoes (I bought 1 can of the tomatoes with green chili, 1 can of the Italian tomatoes and then just one petite cut tomatoes - mine has just a bit of the green chili, while his has the full can)

1 Can (16oz) Kidney beans - undrained (I bought light red kidney beans, I didn't know the difference between dark & light)

2 T Sugar

2 T Chili Powder

Macaroni

*Sautee the beef & onion until brown, drain the grease. (I didn't read this step so I cooked the beef, drained it and added the onions. Oops.)

Stir in remaining ingredients (minus the macaroni). Heat through. Add Macaroni. Simmer.

That's it - that's what it said. So I had to get clarification from my mom and it resulted in the news that the crock pot is actually cooking the chili as we speak (or I write & you read - if it's 2:10 Central Standard time where you're at).

I also seasoned the meat with steak seasoning and added minced onion & garlic while it sauteed. I put a bit in the chili pot as well. 2 T Chili powder didn't seem like a lot, so I put in 5. We'll see what happens.

It's been "simmering" on low for about an hour and it still doesn't taste spicy (my batch at least - his is on the stove and that one too doesn't seem to have much of a kick ... of course I'm all sinus infection-ed up right now so that could be part of the problem.