Red Stew

      I made red stew for dinner tonight.

      It's not chili -- and by not calling it that, I'm free to put all manner of things in it, while still keeping the spice level higher than the kidney beans and elbow macaroni version I grew up with.

      So it started out with a pound of ground beef and a large chorizo sausage, with salt, pepper and chili powder; once it was brown most of the fat was drained off, the meat pushed to the sides and a large onion, diced, started sizzling in the middle.  I chopped up three stalks of celery very thin, added them with some more chili powder, and diced a couple of medium-sized carrots into small pieces.  Added them and went looking for what else might be on the shelf.

      I had a couple of small cans of green chilis.  They went in.  A large box of crushed tomatoes followed and then a smallish can of mixed beans.  (Remember, now, this is red stew, not chili.  So it's allowed.)  Tam's got a big bottle of Korean hot sauce with a bit of sweet to it, really fine stuff indeed, and I drizzled about half a teaspoon of it into the stew.

      That simmered with some more chili powder, a bit of garlic powder, some basil just because and three bay leaves.  I gave it fifteen minutes and added five shishito peppers, cut into 1/4" rings.  They're pretty delicate and you don't want to overcook them -- five minutes more did it, and we had a nice warm meal on cold, damp night, stew thick enough to stand a spoon up.

      It wasn't chili.