Chili for dinner

It's Memorial day in US today. It is the day to remember those who died for the country (I know we have a similar day in M'sia but I am blank with the name right now. All I can remember is we'll get a form asking for donations on that day and I don't think we get a holiday right?). It is a public holiday here but as usual, it doesn't matter to grad students who does not have a family. So it's one of those days when we can take our own sweet time to do stuff and come home early to do other stuff.

Went in to lab this morning to get an experiment going. Came home to do laundry, clean my room and the kitchen. Went out again to Fenner Nature Center for a run. Got home pretty hungry and my fridge is pretty empty now since I don't want to top up groceries before I go to Boston (I take forever to finish food!). Looked into my pantry and found Hormel Chili! Before I came to the States, chili is the spicy pepper family fruit - cili padi, cabai burung, green chili, capsicum, cayenne - stuff like that. It was BK who first introduced me to this wonderful time saving dish. It is a mix of ground beef with kidney beans and tomatoes. Sometimes there's onions and green peppers but that's the basic ingredient. The good ones take a long time to prepare as the beef and beans have to be stewed with the tomatoes until it becomes really soft and mushy. He used to prepare the canned ones for dinner whenever I'm too lazy to cook or when we're in the mood for chili. I can always count on him for ideas when it comes down to canned food.

There are several versions of this dish. There's the ones with more gravy where it is used as a dip for tortilla chips or saltine crackers. I usually get this from Wendy's or from Sparty's. The one from Wendy's is definitely way better but I haven't gotten any since they closed all the Wendy's on campus. The other one is a thicker version. It is usually wrapped in soft tortilla shell and made into burrito. Some places serve them on angel hair pasta (spaghetti) and my favorite one is from Steak n Shake!! That's our hang out place during college days. It was a really nice group of people too but we have all gone our own separate ways...

That's what I made for dinner tonight. It is one of the fast and simple dinner dish. Just have to cook the spaghetti, place a piece of American cheese on top of the spaghetti and scoop some hot chili on top of the cheese. Since I don't have a good recipe for chili nor do I have the time to make them lately, I got the canned one from Hormel. I didn't have any American cheese either so I tore apart the string mozarella I have and placed them on the spaghetti. Yum yum!