Ward Harvest Festival and Chili Recipe

Yesterday was our annual ward Harvest Festival. It is a lot of fun for everyone and the kids have been looking forward to it all week. We got all dressed up in our costumes and headed out to the festivities.


Eli is in the middle with his friends Braden and Alex. They are all very close in age. Braden was a monster too.


Here is my little clan. The babies had on some Halloween orange, but nothing clever. Hey, I have 5 kids now...


Me and my little monster. Eli was diggin' the whole Halloween thing. There was lots of candy and he was happy. He walked around a bit glassy-eyed with all of the commotion.

I decided to enter the chili cook-off competition, even though many of my church friends were "shocked" that I would dare do such a thing, since I just gave birth a few weeks ago. Come on people! It takes about 20 minutes to whip up chili, the easiest thing in the world. Anyhow, there were loads of entries for the little competition and guess who won first place? No, it wasn't the Missy-otties!

IT WAS ME!!! Ha Ha....

It couldn't have happened to a more humble entrant. Plus, my awesomeness cannot be contained. **See, all those tv watching hours when I was heavily-laden with pregnancy has really paid off, hasn't it?

Here is my trophy chili, resting proudly on my junk shelf in the kitchen.

So, I have had many requests for my "secret" recipe. I don't do exact measurements, so I am going to try to tell everyone how I made it as best as I can.

Chili

**Beans**

Dried red kidney

Dried white cannelli

Dried pinto

1 can black beans (I didn't have any dried available) ***add this with everything else, liquid included***

I pressure cooked all of my dried beans in an 8 quart pressure cooker. It was equal parts beans that filled the pot almost half full. However, I only used half of that, so fill beans to about 1/4 of the way full. Fill the pot with water, almost all the way to the top. I threw in about 4 beef bouillon cubes to season the beans. It took about 90-120 minutes to cook and then they were nice and soft.

1 1/2 lbs ground beef
2 cups cooked sirloin beef, cubed
2 small onions
2 anaheim peppers (use any pepper you like)
2 large cans tomato sauce
1 large can stewed tomato
1 large can diced tomato
2 cans diced green chilies
Red Chili Powder (I have no idea how much...but I will guess about 1/4 cup)
Ground cumin (same with this. but I will guess at least a tablespoon)
Salt
Fresh Ground Pepper

Once the beans are cooked, brown the hamburger, diced onions and peppers at the bottom of the stew pot. Add everything else. Bring it to a boil and then turn down to a simmer. Enjoy the yummy goodness.

These amounts were for a large pot of chili. Portion sizes depend on you and what you like. Just add and adjust as needed, but don't forget the diced green chilies because that is the best part.