Chili Day 11/21

Chili day began with Liz and I arriving at Mr. Hyer's house at mid-morning. I came fully prepared in my apron. I had never made chili before, but had a basic idea of what ingredients needed to go into it. There were quite a few other kids there, which made the amount of work we had to do slightly less difficult. I began to chop garlic. I knew that to open the garlic you had to hit it with the edge of the knife, but had never tried it, little did I know it was much more difficult than it seemed. After about 3 cloves, I got the handle of it and it became relatively easy. After that Nathan and I went outside in order to handle the steaks. The steaks only needed to be seared because they cook within the chili later. Nathan and I ended up grilling roughly 26 pounds of steak. We had to develop a system in order to keep the grill from getting too over crowded. We formed an assembly line of sorts, and in the end it worked beautifully. We brought the last of the steak inside where it was chopped up. After beans and tomato sauce were added to onions, garlic, and bacon; the ingredients needed to be brought to a simmer. I had to stir on of the pots in the back only because my arms were long enough to reach. The heat from the stove soon became unbearable. I stuck with the stirring though because I knew that not only did it have to be done, but if I didn't the pot would boil over and there would be bigger problems, such as there being nothing to sell for the Prom fund raiser. We took a break to go with Mrs. Hyer to get apples from a little farm stand not that far away. We got the apples, not to mention a history lesson about cranberry bogs on Cape Cod. I had no idea that so much equipment was needed to pick a berry out of a puddle. I carried the apples back and we stopped to have lunch of smoked chicken. The chicken had been in the smoker since we arrived in the morning. It came out incredibly tender and moist. The steak was then added to the pots, which had to simmer for a couple hours. We then went tromping about the woods, following a few paths. The paths led us to old colonial houses that no longer stood. It was incredibly interesting to know that just the location of lilacs was enough to extrapolate as to the location of the house. We went back to the house and began to pack the chili into containers. The chili containers were then loaded into a few car trunks, while Nathan, Liz and I helped clean up. Liz and I then went along to return the pans to a local restaurant and thank the owners for donating not only the pots but some of the meat as well. The entire chili making process taught me that something that takes relatively little effort, can have a much larger impact later on.