Chocolate Chili and Beer Bread

With the crazy weather in El Paso lately, we’ll been sticking to soups and chili for a while. We have El Paso days with 60 degrees and above weather and we have unseemly cold days with snow, sleet and rain – not El Paso weather at all. With the chill in the air once the sun goes down, all you want to do is warm up. Now’s not really the time for anything served cold.


This recipe, Weeknight Chili with Chocolate, will be included in the new (print) Mi Chita’s Chocolate Recipes book that will come out this year, courtesy of of Copper Canyon Cookbooks (Gloria Chadwick). I’ve made it before but for some reason never got around to posting about it.

As time goes by, I will inform you more about the publishing of the new cookbook. For now, you can still purchase the Mi Chita’s ebook version  via the link on this blog.

Weeknight Chili (with Chocolate)


2 pounds ground beef
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 can (8 ounce) tomato paste
2 cups water
1 small can diced tomatoes
2 tablespoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 disk Mexican chocolate, chopped
1 12 ounce can of beer
1 to 2 tablespoons masa flour for thickening (optional)
2 cups cooked pinto beans (optional)
Grated Cheddar cheese, minced onions and sour cream as garnish, if desred

Brown ground beef and drain. Add onion and garlic and cook until translucent. Add remaining ingredients except for masa and beans. Cook mixture for at least 30 minutes on medium-low heat. Add beans and masa for thickening if desired. Serve hot.

What better way to serve this body-warming chili than with Beer Bread. I won’t lie to you. The bread pictured here actually came from one of those giant “Beer Bread” bottles they sell at gourmet stores. I bought one and stuck it in Bob’s Christmas stocking. It was actually quite tasty. You pour the mix from the bottle into a bowl and add a 12 ounce bottle of beer. Bake it for 45 minutes and it’s done. But I couldn’t give you a picture of the bottle and let it go at that so I found a recipe that might be just as good.

Beer Bread Recipe

http://www.recipezaar.com/Beer-Bread-73440

There are a few recipes for Beer Bread out there, but none as simple (and tasty!) as this one. You can even mix it in the baking pan for easy clean up. This is sensational when served with soups or just as a snack, but don't expect it to be around very long when your family gets a taste of it!
by Gerald Norman

3 cups flour (sifted)
3 teaspoons baking powder (omit if using Self-Rising Flour)
1 teaspoon salt (omit if using Self-Rising Flour)
1/4 cup sugar
1 (12 ounce) can beer
1/2 cup melted butter (1/4 cup will do just fine)
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Mix dry ingredients and beer.
Pour into a greased loaf pan.
Pour melted butter over mixture.
Bake 1 hour, remove from pan and cool for at least 15 minutes.

I hope you all are staying warm.  Weather patters are a jumble right now and it's only the middle of winter.

Kahlua Cake Cookies

Yep! Cookies. I wasn’t quite ready for another cake so soon after the Rum Cake, but since Bob decided he was going to finish off the last of the chocolate chip cookies I made, I decided on Kahlua Cake.


I knew there was a way to turn cake mix into cookie dough and I found it. The ingredients used for the cookies are a little different than for the cake, but the taste is insanely delicious, so I will probably be experimenting on other cake mixes and add-ins for more cookie adventures.

 
Kahlua Cake


1 box German chocolate cake mix
1 small box instant chocolate pudding
4 eggs
2/3 cup oil
2 cups (16 ounces) sour cream
½ cup Kahlua
1 bag (12 ounces) chocolate chips or 1 disk of chopped Mexican chocolate
Powdered sugar
Freshly made whipped cream, optional

Mix first six ingredients then add chocolate chips and blend in well. Grease and flour Bundt pan. Pour in batter and bake in 350º F. oven for 1 hour. After cake is cooled, sift powdered sugar on top. Top with whipped cream if desired.

Instruction for Converting Cake Mix into Cookie Dough
http://www.ehow.com/how_4869707_convert-cake-mix-cookie-dough.html

Grease a cookie sheet and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. You can also use vegetable oil spray or parchment sheets instead of grease, if desired.

Mix together 2 eggs, 1/2 cup of vegetable oil and 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Mixing the wet ingredients together first helps prevent dry pockets of mix from occurring in your dough.

Add the cake mix to the wet ingredients and stir until the mixture is smooth and free of lumps. You can use any flavor of cake mix that you prefer. Flavored cake mixes, such as lemon and strawberry, work just as well as the traditional chocolate, white and yellow cake mixes.

Include any optional ingredients at this point. You can add chocolate chips, chopped nuts, raisins, oatmeal, shredded coconut or anything else to make your cookies taste as though they have been made from scratch. Mix well after adding optional ingredients.

Roll the cookie dough into small balls and place them on the greased cookie sheet. You can use a teaspoon to help you make the cookies a uniform size, or may want to use a cookie scoop. Place the cookies at least 1 inch apart to allow for spreading as the cookies bake.

Bake for approximately 10 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven when they are slightly browned on the bottom and place them on a cooling rack. Allow the cookies to cool for at least 15 minutes before eating.

Note:  I followed these instructions eliminating the chocolate pudding and sour cream from the basic cake recipe. Instead of adding vanilla to the dough I added 1 (slightly overflowing) tablespoon of Kahlua. Then I continued to shape the cookie balls and bake as directed. It’s kind of Kahlua Cake To-Go. Enjoy.

Bob's given these a thumbs up, so I guess they're pretty good.  I love cookies.

Pinwheel Cookies

For Christmas I made some Hershey Kiss Cookies for my son and daughter. One batch with pecans one batch without. This is another cookie recipe that my son Mikey likes to have around the holidays. I did make a batch, but Bob kept eating them, so I had to place them in a tin with a big note saying “Do NOT Touch”.

I felt bad about it so I decided to make my honey his own pinwheels. I think I’ll surprise him with a bowl of vanilla ice cream topped off with a couple of these delicious cookies for dessert after dinner tonight. He can take the rest to work with him (or else I’ll just eat them all!)

Pinwheels
(BAKER’S Book of Chocolate Riches)

2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2/3 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 squares BAKER’S unsweetened chocolate, melted

Mix flour, baking powder and salt. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla; beat well. Gradually add flour mixture, mixing well after each addition. Divide dough in half; blend melted chocolate into one half.

Roll chocolate and vanilla doughs separately between sheets of waxed paper into 12x8-inch rectangles. Remove top sheets of paper and invert vanilla dough onto chocolate dough. Remove remaining papers. Roll up on long side and then wrap in plastic. Freeze for 1 hour. Cut into ¼-inch slices and place on cookie sheets that have been been covered with parchment paper.

Bake at 375-degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or just until cookies have began to brown around edges. Cool on racks. Makes about 4 dozen.

NOTE: I made these with a sprinkle of cinnamon in the vanilla dough and used almond flavoring in both vanilla and chocolate doughs. I wanted to use Mexican chocolate, but I would have had to reduce the amount of sugar called for in the recipe and I have not experimented yet to see by how much. So for now, I just gave it the flavor essence of Mexican chocolate.