Monday, September 02, 2024

Block Chili

 Belle and I were talking this morning over coffee and I asked about "block chili".  I used to see it as a kid in the grocery store.  It was wrapped in wax paper and was a hard, dehydrated block of chili.  Add water, heat and eat.  As I recalled, it was pretty good chili.

Belle commented that her daddy loved the stuff and bought it regularly.  But, shee continued, she saw it in the store last week.  They still make it.  She sent me to the grocers later and I asked the butcher about it.  Sure enough, it was in the shelf near the hot gods.


We cooked a bunch of sausage, bratwurst, and hamburgers yesterday and we were cleaning up leftovers, so I followed the label directions and heated it up while I heated the sausage.  We had good chili dogs for lunch, and the block chili was really nice..

Just in case anyone was wondering.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've never seen that before. Sounds like a great item to keep on hand for extending meals when unexpected company arrives.

Eaton Rapids Joe said...

Hi Pawpaw:

I went looking on-line and all I saw were refrigerated or frozen blocks of chili, not dehydrated.

Bummer. It would be great to have shelf-stable chili that was lighter than canned.

glasslass said...

Same here. Never saw that before and amazon doesn't carry it. That must be strictly regional product.

Anonymous said...

Haven't seen it, but the lable says "keep refrigerated or frozen.
We make and freeze a chili concentrate using the Wick Fowlers spice mix, cubed beef round, tomato paste, and onion, beef browned, the rest added, and baked @ 300° for 4 hours.
Frozen in quart containers, and finished for use with more onion, diced tomatoes, fresh chilis, beer or liquid as needed, and some canned beans if we don't have Texans as guests.
;-) John in Indy

Anonymous said...

Good grief what’s the point of this? Dry beans, dry chiles, dry spices last forever. Tomatoes come in a can, so do beans. Add fresh meat, onions, garlic, bell peppers. It only takes a couple hours to stew.

Drew458