Sue’s Beef Chili

After my mom died, I was tasked with making a video for her memorial service. I went through her computer and found a ton of old family photos that she had sent off to a service to have scanned. At the time, I was thankful to have found these because it made the process of pulling photos for the video way easier. But, looking back, I was not in a place where I was ready to go through the process of looking through the contents of her hard drive (or really any of her belongings). The activity of sorting/compiling/editing the video was so emotionally taxing that it took me awhile to recover. I finished the final cut on a Sunday morning, and I remember having to go lay down the entire rest of the day to decompress. It was just way too much all at once and because of that I stayed away from looking at her hard drive (and the rest of her possessions) for a long time afterwards.

Fast forward to this past fall, during an unseasonably cold week, I woke up with an intense craving for the beef chili that my mom used to make. It was the memory of this that led me back to her hard drive.

I was actually stunned to find a file named “Sue’s Beef Chili” and promptly printed the recipe out.  Of course, as happens a lot in Southeastern NC, the weather then turned warm again and the idea of making chili got tabled. Still, I had the recipe sitting on my desk for 3+ months staring at me and it was kind of the catalyst to the idea of starting this blog.

This past weekend, with the weather finally turning cold again, it seemed like a good time to tackle this one. This was a staple that she always kept in the freezer (which is likely because it makes enough to feed a small army). I have countless memories of eating this for lunch or dinner on a chili cheese dog (I am a weirdo who does not like actual hotdogs).

My version of this didn’t taste exactly like hers. I think some of that is because I forgot to include the 4 T. cider vinegar that she has marked as optional on the original recipe. I mixed a small amount of it into my leftovers and it did come a little closer to the original taste that I remember. I would also likely increase the chili powder next time. Her recipe calls for 6 T with a note to adjust for taste. I think that I used 4 T in this batch.