Jaki Jean & Jean & Jenny

The other night, as I sautéed onions & green pepper in olive oil & red pepper flakes, I thought about where I first tasted the recipe on the menu for the evening.

And how it has changed over the years.

Sometimes I use ground beef, sometimes I use ground turkey.  I have been known to use a soy based ground look alike.  Sometimes it is a green bell pepper, sometimes a green & a red & sometimes I add half a jalapeno pepper.

The other night, I roasted garlic, a new permutation for this recipe.  I am amazed & blown away by the way roasted garlic enhances everything I cook.

Some nights, I use a jar of my homemade tomato sauce, but the other night I used two cans of fire roasted tomatoes once the onions & peppers were soft. 

Some nights, I add only two cans of red kidney beans – other nights I add kidney beans I have cooked from scratch or I mix white & red beans.

These days, I always harvest herbs from my garden because somehow, I feel the result is uniquely my own.

But the recipe is not my own. 

I remember it from a long day ago, a family vacation to California, a vacation that included a visit to my cousin Jenny & her first husband (please forgive me, all ones Zeis).

I remember standing in Jenny’s kitchen while my mother Jean & Jenny talked as Jenny cooked.   

Jenny made a chili of ground beef, onion, green bell pepper, tomatoes, maybe a can of tomato paste (although that may be me projecting into my own permutations of the recipe) & canned kidney beans.

I remember Jenny added spices, but it has been too many years, too many permutations, to identify them. 

In my memory, Jenny served the chili with a salad & warm sour dough bread & the adults drank red wine.

If that memory is different, Jenny, please don’t tell me.

Because all these years, I have served that dish, in all its permutations, with a salad & warm sour dough bread & red wine.

A comfort food.  A comfort memory.

Years after that California trip, during a difficult moment in my teenage life, someone asked me to identify my comfort food.  I tried to describe it & instead cooked it.  A chili of ground beef & onions & peppers & tomatoes & spices served with warm sour dough bread & red wine.

The other night, I reminded Jean about where I got the recipe we have used all these years since that trip to California.

Today, thinking about it, I realize that watching Jean & Jenny interact in Jenny’s kitchen that evening was part of the road that led me to want to cook.

Years after that trip, years after leaving home & getting married & getting unmarried, I found myself in kitchens watching other women cook & interact.

And I knew, I knew I wanted to be a part of that interaction.

Only now, do I realize that it was just not about cooking.

I don’t know what Jean & Jenny talked about that evening in Jenny’s kitchen.  But I did memorize the moment.

And I am still recreating it, every time I recreate that chili.

The recipe & the moment.

Jenny, I also remember the ride in the Corvette.