Bands! Do you miss playing gigs? Rushing to get to the venue for six, having a hasty five-minute line check and then having some dude come up to you after yr set and say he wished you played that other song you do that he really likes? OK yeah maybe not, but if you are missing the gig experience, here is a vegan chilli recipe from Reading’s celestial tectonic smushers Cody Noon to give you the feeling that yr about to play a set to a dingy basement. Make it for yr next livestream gig, see what happens:
This was adapted from a Heston recipe for a very fancy, very meaty chilli - it's evolved several times, first because I lack the patience to do all the proper steps and then to veggie and finally to vegan. The key ingredients are probably the star anise which amps up the umami factor and the Mexican chillies which add depth of flavour to die for! I'm also a big fan of smoked paprika. Word to the wise - if followed exactly this is a fairly spicy dish so if you want to dial the heat down take out some of the chillies/spiced 'butter'.
The marmite in the spice butter was Heston's idea (full disclosure by the way, Haydn does 95% of the work when cooking this so all good ideas are theirs, hence me also being able to be objective about how nice it is). The whole spice butter thing seems to lead to a really unique flavour, it's a bit of a faff but worth it. The star anise is cool as well and makes the soy mince taste very meaty.
Ingredients
For spiced 'butter':
Olive oil (2 tbsp)
Cumin (1.5 tsp)
Cayenne (1.5 tsp)
Smoked Paprika (1.5 tsp)
Chilli Powder (1.5 tsp)
Tomato Ketchup (1 tsp)
Marmite (1 tsp)
Vegetable oil/melted non-dairy margerine (125 ml)
For Chilli:
1 Tin Kidney Beans
1 Packet Vegan Mince
Onion
Carrot
Mushrooms (optional if you like it earthy)
Bell Pepper (optional if you like it tangy/colourful)
Star Anise
3 cloves of garlic
6 Mexican Chillies (ancho/pasilla are good - but get whatever takes your fancy, you can get these dried - before you start rehydrate and roughly chop these cuties - they will smell so good)
Chilli Flakes
30g tomato puree
375ml red wine
Tin of tomatoes
500 ml veg stock (2 cubes)
Salt and pepper
Method:
Make 'butter' by lightly frying cumin, chilli and cayenne for 2 seconds. Pour into bowl and add paprika, ketchup, marmite and vegetable oil. Mix and refrigerate.
Fry onion and star anise (I put it in a tea strainer for easy removal later) in olive oil on medium heat for 7-10 minutes or until onion begins to colour then add diced carrot (mushrooms and pepper if you fancy), ancho chilli and garlic (make a little hollow for the garlic and cook it against the hot pan until it loses its acrid smell but careful not to burn it). Cook until carrot is soft.
Add tomato puree, stir and cook for 5 more minutes until mushy and orange. Then add wine and reduce by two thirds and remove star anise.
Stir in spiced 'butter', mince, diced tomato and stock, simmer as long as you fancy on low heat. To finish fold in drained kidney beans and season.
You can add chopped roasted peppers, lime zest (if you want to be careful about heat you can divide the spiced butter and let folks add more at this stage too).
Serve tortilla chips and rice.
You can get at least 3 meals for 2 out of this
Cody Noon have a vinyls record out called Ace of Wands, which you can get from the Bandcamp. They’ll be in issue 4 with this and some words about some good eatin in Reading when we can go eatin in Reading again (you can order some sauce from Tutu’s Ethiopian Table in the meantime). Follow Cody Noon on insta too for updates and occasional glimpses/interruptions of Bok the cat (pictured above - likes a warm hob, dislikes pretty much everything else).
OTHER CRUMBS FROM MY TABLE [I.E. CORNER OF THE HOB IN-BETWEEN PANCAKES]:
I’m on sourdough loaf number 4 now (the best yet). If you haven’t made any yet, I recommend this recipe which I’ve been using (step 1 confuses me - just feed yr starter in the morning and start step 2 in the evening).
If yr looking for something (more) to read, I finally got around to reading this utterly essential piece by Ruby Tandoh on the life and influence of Esiah Levy - prolific seed grower who sent handwritten envelopes of seeds from his kitchen table all around the world. It’s a long read, but it’s worth it.
I started listening to the audiobook of Slice Harvester: A Memoir in Pizza by Colin Atrophy Hagendorf - one punk’s quest to taste and review a plain slice of pizza from every pizza parlour in Manhattan. The print book is I think out there buried in Amazon-owned used lists, but the audiobook is on Bandcamp. I’m only a couple chapters in but it’s a real heartening listen about how identity and family and sense of self and purpose all fold around various different slices of pizza. They recorded the audiobook themselves, at home, for their grandma Bernice (“so you don’t have to listen to that mook the publishers hired who did a bad job”). It’s really sweet to listen to - lots of apologies for bad language or bad prose (or bad voiceover-ing), lots of asides/personal clarifications and occasional cat interruptions. Highly recommended (Colin also has a newsletter Life Harvester, and a YouTube series Pizza Pals interviewing punks in pizza parlours worth checking out).
Listening wise, it was Bandcamp day last Friday, so I went a bit nuts. Grabbed that new Black Dresses album, which sounds like some kinda ultra-queered hybrid mangle of every trash music genre from about 1999 onwards (absolutely fucking slays). Picked up albums by Backxwash, Fitness Womxn, Tara Clerkin Trio, Gentle Stranger and the pre-order for the new Still House Plants (I love this band so much and can’t wait to see them play live again). Otherwise, listening to lots of emotive/immersive house music (I haven’t figured out genres in electronic music yet). Octo Octa and Eris Drew, that kinda stuff. Good to lose yrself in / stir some cream into a dal to.
More next week. Had some good video interviews for future CHEWns this week too! If you’ve got something you wanna say on the subject of food/music, or just wanna boast about the food you’ve made in lockdown, drop me a line!