Baked Chili-Cheese Dogs

This is a great recipe to make if you're having a Superbowl party, or if you're just having people of the male persuasion over.  I've included a link to my new favorite chili recipe, but I won't sue you if you use your own recipe, or, god forbid, chili out of a can.

Leah's Chili Recipe

Yield:  Serves 4-8

Ingredients:
8 hot dogs
8 hot dog buns
2 cups chili
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Hot dog garnishes/condiments (optional)
Such as chopped onion, pickles or relish, mustard, ketchup, diced tomato and/or pepperocini, etc

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a 9 x 13 baking pan with cooking spray.  Place a hot dog into each bun, then place into pan.  Repeat until all of the hot dogs have been squeezed into place.

Ladle approximately 1/3 cup of chili onto each hot dog and then sprinkle with each of the cheeses.  Bake in the oven for approximately 20 minutes, or until cheese is melty and buns are brown.  Use a flexible spatula to remove hot dogs from pan, then serve with desired garnishes and condiments.  Enjoy! 

Note:  I made a sort of healthy version - turkey franks with turkey chili.  Of course, the cheese is still a heart attack waiting to happen, but you do what you can!  The point is, you can customize this easily with any type of franks, chili and/or cheese.

Sweet Surrender Fire Roasted Turkey Chili

People are always trying to reinvent chili, but I've always preferred the basic formula. What's not to like about old fashioned chili with all the standard spices and fixings?

For this recipe, I wanted to try making a sweeter version, to use as a topping for baked chili dogs. I experimented with a baked beans flavor by adding molasses and brown sugar and surprise- it's my favorite chili recipe ever!  Of course you can sub any type of meat for the ground turkey, or omit altogether for a meatless version.  This is a particularly colorful chili, with four kinds of beans and five kinds of peppers.

Yield: 6-8 servings

Ingredients:
3 bell peppers (1 each yellow, green and red), seeded and chopped
1 large onion, chopped
1 small jalapeno pepper
1 head of garlic
1 16 ounce can each black, pinto, kidney and white beans
1 28 ounce can diced tomatoes
1/3 cup molasses
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon oregano
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 teaspoon cumin
3 cups chicken broth
1 pound ground turkey, browned and drained
3 dried arbol chiles, seeds and stems removed
3 tablespoons flour
Salt and pepper, to taste

Directions:
Start by roasting the peppers, garlic and onion.  Peel the onion and break the garlic cloves apart, but leave inside the skin.  Leave the peppers whole.  Drizzle the veggies lightly with olive oil, sprinkle lightly with salt and pepper, and roast in a 400 degree oven for approximately 20 minutes, turning once, until the vegetables are soft and have begun to char.  Remove from the oven and allow to cool, then peel the garlic and set aside.  Dice the peppers (remove the skin if desired, I actually like the flavor and color of it in the chili), jalapeno, and onion.

Add the vegetables to a large pot with 2 cups of the chicken broth, reserving one cup.  Add the cans of beans (including the liquid from the cans), diced tomatoes, molasses and brown sugar, and turn heat to medium.

For this recipe, I used a fun technique I learned from another recipe, roasting the chiles and then pureeing them to make a version of my own chili powder.  Yum!  If you want, you can omit the arbol chiles and add prepared chili powder to taste, skipping this next step altogether, but it's fun ; ) and I thought it added a nice flavor and creamy texture to the chili.

In a separate skillet, roast the dried arbol chiles over high heat for 2-4 minutes, until they begin to brown.  Remove and cool.  Add the roasted chiles to the bowl of a blender or food processor, along with the reserved cup of chicken broth, flour, roasted garlic, and spices (cumin, oregano, and chili powder).  Process until incorporated into a smooth paste, then scrape from the bowl and reserve.

Next, cook the meat over high heat until browned.  Drain and add to the chili.  Add the pureed chili powder to the chili, mixing to incorporate.  If you are concerned about the heat or seasoning, add in batches and taste until you are happy with the flavor.  Cook the chili for about an hour, until it thickens and the beans and meat are sufficiently tender, then season to taste and serve.  Serve with any of the traditional garnishes (cheese, sour cream, onions, cilantro, etc).  Enjoy!

Spicy Red Beans and Rice

This was an easy weeknight dish to whip up.  I used turkey andouille, to make it a bit more healthy, but you could use standard pork sausage with the same results.

Ingredients:
1 pound turkey or pork andouille, sliced 
5 -6 slices bacon, cooked and roughly chopped or crumbled
1 medium onion, diced
1 medium red bell pepper, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 cans (15 1/2 ounces) red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 can (13 ounces) stewed tomatoes
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 tsp paprika
1 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (or to taste)
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 bay leaf
3 cups cooked white rice
Salt and pepper, to taste

Directions:
In a skillet, cook bacon until crisp and set aside on paper towels to drain.  Using the same pan, brown the sausage.  Add the onion, garlic and red pepper and cook in the bacon fat until soft.  Next, add the beans, chicken broth, stewed tomatoes, spices, and bay leaf, and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat to medium low and simmer for 10 minutes.  Remove the bay leaf and add salt and pepper to taste.

Ladle the beans over the rice or mix them together before serving.  Sprinkle bacon pieces over and serve.  Enjoy!

Note:  These were the basic measurements I started with, but I like things spicy so I ended up adding more heat... as noted by the color of the rice, ha ha.  Make it as hot as you can stand!

Sloppy Joe Sliders

 

This is a relatively healthy version of sloppy joes, perfect for a mid-week meal.  Not very glamorous, but what do you expect on a Wednesday night?  If desired, you can substitute ground beef, but the sauce is tasty enough that it tastes just as good with turkey (and I think the texture is better!).

Ingredients: 

1 pound lean ground turkey
1 15 oz can tomato sauce
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp white vinegar
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp cayenne pepper
Salt to taste
Ground black pepper to taste

Buns (your choice!)

Directions:

In a skillet over medium heat, brown the turkey, then drain any grease.  Add tomato sauce, vinegar, sugar and spices; mix thoroughly.  Reduce heat, and simmer for 30 minutes, until sauce has thickened.  Season with salt and pepper and taste - add more cayenne or sugar if necessary.  It should be sweet and spicy!

Tips:

Serve on toasted hamburger buns or mini Hawaiian rolls, which have a nice sweetness.  Toasting the buns will stop the sandwiches from getting soggy.  Enjoy!

Baked Potato Bar

This is less a recipe than a fun idea for something to do with leftover chili!  This creates a lot of options for different types of eaters - for instance, I had broccoli, turkey chili, and sour cream on my potato. Kyle had butter, Velveeta cheese sauce, turkey chili, bacon, and regular cheese.  You can see a photo of his heart attack meal below.


Ingredients:
Baked Potatoes
Butter


Suggested Toppings:
Sour Cream
Bacon
Chili
Velveeta Cheese Sauce
Shredded Cheese
Broccoli


Directions:
Make sure to bake the potatoes in the oven. Yes, you can make them in the microwave in a fraction of the time, but the skins won't be crispy and the potato won't be as delicious.  It takes about 50 minutes to bake them in the oven.


For the Velveeta cheese sauce, you will simply need to slice off a cube of that strange, oddly jiggly substance, and melt it in a sauce pan with some milk.  For my cheese sauce, I used about half a block of Velveeta and 1/2 a cup of milk, which made an unnecessarily enormous quantity of cheese sauce.  So, you might want to try using l/3 or 1/4 of the cheese block and less milk.  The cheese sauce can also be used on the broccoli by itself.


For the bacon, I simply cooked it until it was crispy, drained it on paper towels, and crumbled it.  And as far as the chili, everyone has their own recipe for that, so you are on your own there.


Kyle's loaded potato - a masterpiece of cheese: