Chili Cook-Off

Each year Hubby's office holds a chili cook-off between the employees. Last year Hubby took my chili concoction and we placed 2nd in the mild division. However, we still maintain the judging was rigged...;o).

Tomorrow is the annual event and so this evening we cooked up our chili & hopefully the results will be much more successful than last year. Since this is Hubby's deal, I made him cook tonight which was quite an entertaining process all by itself. I played supervisor and watched as Hubby made the spicy yumminess!!! Nothing is on the line except for pride & bragging rights, but for us that's more than enough reason to compete!

Our chili recipe is a very-modified recipe of Skyline chili that my mom got from a subscription to Top Secret Recipes. She & I have made various modifications to it based on our taste buds & I think we've managed to come up with a recipe that is just wonderful. Since I'm practically 100% positive that none of the competition read this blog I thought I'd share our chili recipe! It's so super easy to try it out as the weather starts getting a little more chilly!

INGREDIENTS:
1 lb ground beef
2 14.5 oz cans of beef broth
1 6 oz can tomato paste
1/2 cup water
2 tbls. cornstarch
4 tsp. chili powder
1 tbls. white vinegar
1 1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/8 tsp black pepper
1 4 oz can chopped green chiles
8 jalepeno slices

Brown the ground beef in a large saucepan over medium heat. Do not drain. Make sure the ground beef is broken up into very small pieces (about the size of uncooked rice).

Turn off the heat and add the rest of the ingredients to the pan. Whisk the ingredients so that the tomato paste and corn starch are mixed in. Turn the heat back up to medium and bring the mixture to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 60-75 minutes or until chili reaches desired thickness. Serve immediately with plenty of cheese & crackers. Yield: 5 cups

You can adjust the chili powder, green chiles, or jalepeno slices depending on how hot you like your chili. Obviously most chili recipes call for beans but we don't like beans in our house so those are obviously left out! I love this recipe because you can freeze or refrigerate the leftovers and use later! Enjoy!

EDITED: WE WON!!! (so there were only 3 other employees who brought chili & the prize was pretty bad--a crappy laptop case, but that's not what matters...the important thing is WE WON!!!)