Cornbread and Chili

I mentioned before that I would share the amazing cornbread and chili recipe.  Here it is.

When we first got married, I discovered that Knut and I ate chili very different ways.  I had always eaten chili in a bowl with maybe some cheese on top.  He had always eaten chili over rice and mixed them both together.  There was a lot of grumbling if I served chili without rice because the meal was very incomplete.

9 years later, and we’ve met our compromise.  We both love chili and cornbread.  I heavily modified a cornbread recipe online so that I could use yogurt and whole wheat flour.  It was an instant family favorite:

1/2 cup butter
1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 cup plain yogurt (we use our homemade stuff!)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 cup cornmeal
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 tsp salt

Heat the oven up to 375 and grease an 8 inch square glass pan (I’ve doubled this and used a glass 9×13 as well.)  Simply mix the ingredients in the order given, pour into pan and bake for 30-40 minutes.

It is a very sweet cornbread, so honey is not needed when you serve.(although there is no law…)

P.S. on this recipe…the whole wheat pastry flour is different than whole wheat flour.  It’s ground finer and makes it a better substitute for white flour.  If you don’t have or cannot buy near you whole wheat pastry flour, than substitute white flour, not whole wheat, otherwise it will turn out very dense and heavy.

As for the chili, I prefer my mom’s recipe…tweeked.

Mary’s Chili:

1 lb ground beef
1/2 medium onion, minced
1 can of tomato soup (I’ve used pureed roasted tomatoes from the garden as well)
2 cans of beans, either kidney, chili, or black
make a paste of:
2 T of chili powder
1T of flour
1/8 tsp salt
3T of water

This recipe is for one “batch” although I used to always double the batch and freeze what we didn’t eat for another meal.  Now I triple the batch and freeze the rest for another meal.  Brown the beef with the onions.  Add all the cans.  If doubling or tripling the recipe, hold back on one can of beans.  It gets to be a bit much.  Drain the cans if they are kidney or black, but save the chili sauce if you choose that route.  I’m currently working on preparing some dried beans for this recipe from Kitchen Stewardships eBook on Everything Beans because it will literally cut the cost of this meal in half.  Something I’m working on…

Add the paste and simmer for 45 minutes.  Sometimes I do more, sometimes I do less.

This chili freezes beautifully in a gallon freezer bag, so I like to make lots at once so I save time for later.  I’m all about freezer meals!