Both of our kitchens are an in-line layout (stop me if you've heard this before). We're lucky to have high ceilings, and a pretty long room (15+ feet), but the whole thing is less than 8 feet wide. So there's not much latitude when it comes to laying out appliances. Plus there's three doorways in each kitchen, so there's a lot of dead space in the rooms.
We also have a huge old fridge. The upside is that it's a side-by-side model, but it always did stick out from the countertop. So, when D put the dishwasher in, we moved the fridge and turned it 90 degrees. The result? More counterspace (we got a butcher block top for it from the lady that gave us the dishwasher. Less claustrophobia - with the fridge in its new spot, the kitchen seems to open up once you pass that. It's still a little cramped if there's more than 2 people in there, but I feel much more comfortable in there now.
Plus, there now is not usually a gigantic pile of dishes in the sinks, in the drainer, on the one sliver of countertop, on top of the stove.... you get the picture. And I only have to wash big bowls or pots by hand - which is the easy part.
I couldn't be happier :)
As for the chili - one of the graduate students is holding a chili cook-off today, so after I went to work this morning, I stopped at the store on the way home, and then made a black bean chili. I didn't have any ground beef, and to be honest I'm not really good at cooking meat, so I just went vegetarian. And made sure to add only veg stock, so if there are vegetarians there, they can eat it too.
It was a completely new recipe. I usually make black bean chili from an old cookbook, Vegetarian Delights (or something like that), which was my first veg cookbook. I bought it when I first moved to Pittsburgh, with a gift certificate my friend Mary gave me when I moved away. But, I don't know where that particular cookbook is right now. And I didn't feel like searching the house for it.
So I winged it. Here goes (so far it tastes pretty awesome):
Ericka's Black Bean chili - serves 4-6
one can black beans
one can kidney beans
5-6 cloves garlic, minced
2 med-sm onions, finely chopped (I used one white, one yellow)
olive oil
~ 20 oz diced tomatoes in juice (I used one 14 oz can, but it wasn't quite enough so I added another half)
~ 1 tbsp French Thyme
** All spice amounts are a guess. I shake some out in my hand, and just throw stuff in until it looks right.**
1 tbsp cumin
2 tbsp chili powder
1/2 tsp mole powder (mine is from the garden last year, I only got 5 peppers, but I dried them & ground them by hand, and I wanted to use them for something)
couple of shakes of ancho chili powder
1/2 tsp cayenne powder
salt
1 tsp paprika
1 cup vegetable stock (if you don't care whether it's totally veg, you can use chicken stock)
Probably about 1 cup of beer, I used some East End Brewing Company Trippelicious that we had left over from D's birthday - mmmm, very good
1 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
Cast-iron skillet
Rocking French enameled cast-iron pot w/lid.
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Heat some olive oil in the skillet, then add the garlic, and thyme. Let it get nice & aromatic, then add onion & saute for 3-4 mins. Add tomatoes and cook for another 2 minutes or so.
Transfer to your amazing French enameled cast-iron pot. Rinse the canned beans off well, and then add them to the pot. Throw some cumin & chili powder in there and add the veg stock. Stir it around, cover it, and let it cook for a few minutes. Open it back up, add the rest of the powdered spices & the beer, and simmer for ~ 20 minutes. Taste it, add the cilantro & anything else you want to tweak, and simmer for another 15 minutes. D suggested I add some lime juice, so I squeezed in a bit and cooked another 10 minutes after that.
Yum!
