Easy Vegan Sausage Chili and Sarson Ka Saag Pizzas

So I snagged the Emeril deep-dish pizza crust recipe, subbed out semolina flour for half corn meal and whole wheat flour, and made the 12" recipe on a 14" pan (you get roughly the style of pizza I gre up with in Youngstown except that it has a nice bit of crunch (typically our doughs didn't have anything along the lines of coarse flour or corn meal at all, I like the addition).

Friday while at work, I had decided to set out and build some junk food pizzas. I saw some post extolling the virtues of Daiya, and bored with it and Daiya, I thought to myself I might as well plop down some money on a hefty hand of constipation and sodium and knock out some junk food pizza.

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The Clintonvillain's Pozole: Clintonville Chili Bowl

Saturday there was a chili cookoff. This is my first chili cookoff, and first time making chili at all (I know, QQ...) since, since turning vegan. 

Frankly, I have been intimidated of relying on my newer skills to attempt something like this. Chili was my favorite meaty meal. In the few months of being vegan I have encountered many tacitly solicited opinions on the things people could never give up. Obviously at the top are bacon and cheese; personally, it is over-medium eggs for me, and I still have longings when I see them. 

But the thing that, before the jump, I thought I could never give up cooking was chili. Just flick through that tag. Fortunately, I have disabused myself of that notion.

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Potato Pizza for Ranchers, and its good for you, even if its made with beer.

The toppings above? Well, if you recall the Vegan Curried Pumpkin Chili, aka el Chilitoaxilitlo, I riffed on that and made a kind of chili-soup hybrid with refried beans and beans and then I added more roasted butternut squash puree, and then some cauliflower puree and a can of pureed tomatoes. Wow right? Well anyway, last night I snagged some butterbeans and a block of soft silken mori-nu and pureed those guys and created this, I swear to god, bean-vegetable-based ranch dressing. After finding out Beth is a big fan of sweet potatoes, and incidentally having one at my house, I decided to saute some scalloped  ones (those are really just thick slices, I know; don't judge me).

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Three Things (of no consequence to anyone but me)

There are a few items to cover that I have noticed going over in my brain.

Ohio and Yuengling: Yuengling, good for you, you burst your cherry and you're distributing in Ohio. I am glad that you think your beer is fantastic. I grew up in Youngstown, OH and regular trips were made by many of your advocates and apologists to Sharon, PA in the interest of procuring your goods. Based on regular exposure from ten years ago, and sporadic exposure subsequently, I feel confident saying that your beer is not bad, but not much in the way of superior to anything Coors or Miller or Budweiser regularly do. Your product is just marginally less generically formulated. I await the Rolling Rock Reckoning you one day will face.

Gaddafi: So a terrorism supporting newsmaker who wore crazy clothes died. No big deal. But what I am curious about is this, when will there be a Charles Krafft Bone-China Teapot in his memory a Memento Mori? Furthermore, if these are using human bones, are they cruelty free?

Chili: I have done so much with chili, but talking to ב yesterday I realized that most of my work was done in meat based chili. She had mentioned people talking about foods as being a symphony of flavors. Granted, I don't think I am around anyone who describes food precisely like that, but it seems like a nice ideal to shoot for. Now I'm not portraying some false modesty; my chili is tasty and long-winded and complex. It's more in the shape of a jazz sextet than an orchestral anything though. Nonetheless, I haven't mastered bringing this technique to my vegan offerings so well. Must work on...

Huffman's Chili and the Upper Arlington Fall Fest

First, I recommend anyone interested participate next year; the organizers were not only organized and well-seasoned, but they were incredibly personable and relaxed and eased even my nerves.

So I didn't walk away with either the basket for People's Choice or Judge's Choice, but I got to see a good number of spoons (dba. votes; the crowd gets a spoon, tries all the chilis, then drops their spoon in the box in front of their fave chili) drop in my chilis' boxes, and I got a good chance to talk to the respective purveyors a good deal. A nice amount of shock and delight came out of both crock pots, so my personal takeaway was pretty good. (The only problem I had was with my crock pot for the vegan chili; it didn't wholly heat up and served tepid samples the first quarter of the way through.)

Let's get straight to the bones. I'm going to drop the carnivore rundown at the end; I don't want to scare off my vegan friends up front.

This represents the third attempt at refining and improving the Vegan Curried Pumpkin Chili, aka el Chilitoaxilitlo. So for a final refinement;

• add refried beans with 45 minutes to go
• add pinto beans with 25 minutes to go

Actually... that's it.

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and then the one person stacking meaningless objects in an arbitrarily selected pattern says to the other

Updated on 9:00AM by mfg

Just a little update.

Haven't had a chance to compile a full post on Huffman's Chili cookoff, but I will say it was fun and a great opportunity for some face to face with the people I was sharing the food with.

It reminded me of the best part of BaconCamp; the part where we stood by our respective dishes and served it to everyone and had a chance to explain what went into it.

As for pie-making, I got the little book last night and have been going through it trying to decide which one to make first. I am a devotee of mousses so that may color my choice, along with the fact I wasn't quite able to nail mine with the Oreo Pumpkin experiment. I have received some subsequent advice and cleared up some loose ends about vegan thickening agents, so I am looking forward to whenever my next attempt occurs. For the landslide already documented, check out the gallery of pics.

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Recipe & pictures: Vegan Curried Pumpkin Chili, savory autumn delight

Updated on 12:19PM by mfg

Last night we had quite the spread over at John & Miss Kristin's. I am sorry my taunts to the interwebs did not land. There was fantastic @Xandrews artisan bread, wee loaves and a focaccia. Miss Kristin made an apple crisp with four varieties of fresh picked Ohio. Now I have no idea how to make those tasty bits so I won't even pretend.

However, my primary contribution was a Curried Pumpkin Chili. And today is the first day where I wish I had worn a jacket, so there is a sense of urgency to this post; here's how you make this smooth body warmer.

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