Hey, That Ain't Chocolate Moose

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Many years ago the principal of Robert Service School in Dawson City, Yukon quit a few days before school was to open in September.


While the search was on for a permanent replacement, the art and home economics teacher was appointed acting principal for six weeks and I was hired to fill her position.



The art I was qualified to teach.



The home economics, maybe not.

In those days I knew how to fry an egg and in a pinch had been known to open a box of frozen fish and chips.



But I was fresh out of Teacher's College and wanted desperately to land my first job so I lied hinted to the superintendent that I was the Yukon's answer to Julia Child.



"What are the chances I'll have to cook anything in six weeks?" I thought.

"I'll teach table manners or something useful like that."



About half way through my first home economics class, which consisted of 8 sullen grade nine girls, a native man in hunting gear suddenly materialized in the doorway.



He strode over to the table where the girls were slouched and dumped a huge bleeding hunk of something in front of me.

Then without a word of explanation, he left.



It wasn't pretty.

The animal had been butchered where it fell and because it was wet with blood, lots of interesting things had stuck to it.

Things like dirt, twigs, leaves, bugs and probably some other stuff I didn't want to think or know about.



The sullen girls snickered, so I did the only teacherly thing I could think to do.

Once I was sure it wasn't moving, I ignored it.





"There's something bleeding in the home ec room and I don't know what to do with it," I said to the principal at recess.



"Oh good," she said, "he brought it in.

There's a meat grinder in the cupboard.

Show the girls how to grind it up and make moose chilli con carne."



Grind it up?

Moose chilli con carne?



"You mean you want me to cook it?

Jeesh!  I was thinking more along the lines of calling in the priest and giving it a decent burial."



She just looked at me.





Anyway, I didn't keep the Yukon recipe I used that day, but I found this one on line.

So this is for all of you hunters and carnivores out there.


Just don't worry about saving any for me.



Moose Chilli Con Carne:


Ingredients:
• 1 pound Moose Mince
• 6 Cloves garlic (There’s no such thing as too much Garlic )
• 1 large onion, quartered and sliced
• 28 ounce (796ml) can of diced tomatoes
• 28 ounce (796ml) can of tomato sauce
• 1 small can tomato paste
• 14 ounce (398ml) Red Kidney Beans
• 14 ounce (398ml) Baked Beans
• 1 chopped green bell pepper
• 2 tablespoons chilli powder
• salt to taste
• 2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
• 1/2 teaspoon ground red chillies (more or less to suit)
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 cup Good Red Wine



Directions:
• In a skillet heat Olive oil and cook onion and garlic until soft.
• Add meat and brown.
• Add remaining ingredients.
• Simmer until fully cooked.


Serve Moose Chilli Con Carne with Fresh Bread

Related articles

• Chilli Con Carne (itsnotartitsdinner.wordpress.com)

That Tastes Souper!

H1N1 flu was not particularly harmful to humans, but boy, it sure decimated the doctor's office magazine population.


Post swine flu, my own doctor's office is as small and bare as Old Mother Hubbard's cupboard.


And efforts to repopulate the area have met with little success.



I mention this because today's post is a recipe and I found it in an old Chatelaine Magazine, you guessed it, lying around my doctor's office.

I mourn the end of an era

 and dedicate this post

 to the memory of all magazines that have been sent to the recycling plant

 rather than being allowed to live out their days

 in a warm doctor's office somewhere.

*

CARNIVORE SOUP *

Ingredients:


8 tomatoes
1 sweet onion
2 hot Italian sausages (omit if you are a herbivore, it still tastes great)
1 head of garlic
1/4 cup of olive oil
1 tsp salt
2 tsp Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp smoked or regular paprika
10 oz can of chicken broth (herbivores use veggie broth)
sprig of fresh thyme or basil (like you are going to spend 5 bucks on a bunch of fresh thyme so you can use one sprig, eh?)

Directions:


- preheat oven to 450
- have your oven racks in the top and bottom third of your oven
- cut tomatoes and onions into wedges
- slice sausages into quarters
- slice of the top of the garlic and discard the loose skins
- tumble the vegetables, garlic and sausage into two large rimmed baking dishes
- drizzle with oil and sprinkle with dried seasonings
-stir

roast 40 - 50 minutes (until veggies are lightly charred)

stir and rotate about half way through

- Put tomatoes and onions in a food processor, squeeze in garlic and discard the skin

- put a little broth in the baking dish and scrape up the brown bits, put them in the food processor
- pour the tomato mixture into a sauce pan and add the remaining broth
- bring to a boil

 - slice the sausages and scatter on top of the soup

- gobble it up

*

This recipe makes about 4 bowls of soup.  I kept my snarky comments to a minimum and tried to post the recipe just the way it appeared in the magazine.

I bought all of the ingedients, except the garlic at Rick's Country Deli on Quaker Road in Pelham.

*My name for the soup. I have no idea what Chatelaine called it.