Thursday, December 3, 2009

Soyrizo Chili

For dinner last night, I whipped up a bowl of my winter stand-by soyrizo chili. I used to make this stuff by the truckload last winter, when emotionally unavailable men and my fears of the future were failing to keep me warm at night. I'd make one giant batch and store it in tiny containers in the freezer, like little pockets of hope saved up for the more biting nights.
I don't know if it was spring weather that made me grow tired of it, but this habit eventually came to a halt. It wasn't until last week, shivering in the Trader Joe's fridge aisle, that I spotted the soyrizo and decided to give it another go.

As soon as I added the fake pork to my oil-onion-garlic combo spitting in the pan, the smell of senior year on Armadale hit me like a load of textbooks upside the head. I hadn't realized I missed it, but man alive, the nostalgia that came from the smell of ever-softening carrots and kidney beans bubbling up with chipotle paste was enough to make my eyes water. And no, it wasn't from the onions--I had my goggles on.The sweet potato boat was a last-minute decision, but one I'm pretty proud of. I think it's safe to say I'm about to go on another chili binge--next time I pop one of these out of the freezer, it's going on my vegan wheat cornbread!

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