Gross Football Lunch – Week 2, 2024 NFL Season

Recipe of the Week: Three-Bean Weeknight Chili

Method & Analysis:
There are two kinds of chili in this world. The first kind is what I like to call True Chili. True Chili is a whole production, and requires lots of active cooking time and passive cooking time. That’s because the key ingredient of a True Chili is a True Chili base. In order to make a True Chili base, you must toast dried chilies, simmer the toasted chilies in stock, and finally blend the softened chilies, stock, and spices into a smooth paste. Then and only then may you proceed to cooking your aromatics, but before you do that, you will most certainly want to brown whatever meat you are using so that you can saute your aromatics in whatever fat and browned meaty bits remain the pot afterwards. Once your base is going and your liquid is added and your meat is returned to the pot, you must then simmer your True Chili for an absolute bare minimum of two hours, and almost certainly longer than that. Anything less than that, and your resulting product will be thin and watery and while it may still taste good enough, it will fail to reach its potential as a True Chili.

True Chili is a major time investment, and who has time these days? That is where the second type of chili comes in; I call this kind Weeknight Chili. As its name implies, Weeknight Chili is the kind of chili to make when time is short and you want a meal that checks most of the same boxes as a True Chili. Weeknight Chili eschews the pre-cooking involved with making a True Chili paste and skips straight to browning meat and sauteing aromatics, and requires less simmering. A Weeknight Chili will never be the best chili you’ve ever had, but when it’s done right, it will be good enough.

By virtue of being a vegetarian chili, this recipe further eschews the meat-browning process. Talk all the shit about vegetarian chili you want; it cannot hurt me, because while this chili is unsexy, it gets the job done. It delivers chili-like flavors and chili-like satisfaction in an easy and relatively healthy package. Yes, there’s a lot of ingredients, and there’s a higher quotient of active cooking time than a True Chili, but this recipe requires no culinary technique whatsoever, and can be whipped together in an hour if you’re efficient. Hell, I might be the least efficient cook on the face of the planet and I can still get this particular chili on the table in 90 minutes, tops. It is the perfect recipe for a day when everyone is tired, everyone is hungry, and time is of the essence. Let’s get to work.

Dice up a large onion and throw it in your pot with some olive oil and salt, then set your pot on medium-low heat. Once your onion is going, dice up one bell pepper and add it in, too. You can bump this up to medium of you want, but in my view, it’s best to be patient with the aromatics. This chili cooks quickly and softer aromatics with a more developed flavor profile will make a lot of difference. Give these peppers and onions a good ten minutes or so, stirring occasionally. While they cook, dice up some jalapeno, mince some fresh garlic, and drain and rinse your cans of beans. (Remember to take the jalapeno seeds out if you want a milder chili, and keep them in if you want a hotter one.) Once the peppers and onions are starting to turn a gentle brown and have softened a fair amount, bump the heat up to medium and add the garlic and jalapeno.

Keep sauteing everything until the garlic and jalapeno become fragrant, then add your spices. Dump in the cumin, coriander, oregano, and cayenne and cook them for about a minute. Once those spices start wafting their goodness through your kitchen, add enough tomato paste to coat everything, as well as a hefty portion of salt and pepper. Stir occasionally, until the tomato paste turns a deeper shade of red and starts to form a thin coating on the bottom of your pot. This will only take a few minutes. Don’t stir too much; if you leave it alone for a bit, some of the tomato paste will stick to the bottom of the pot and give you tasty stuff to scrape off the bottom once the liquid is added. You’ll want as much stuck stuff as you can get. This is a vegetarian chili and there are no browned meat remnants sticking to the bottom of your pot. Stuck tomato paste is your last, best chance to manufacture something resembling a proper crust on the bottom of your pot.

Once your tomato paste is cooked, congratulations! The base of your chili is ready, which means most of the work is already done. Open your cans of tomatoes and dump them in, then add your drained and rinsed beans. Add a good amount of salt – and add more than that if either the tomato or bean cans had No Salt Added on the label – and stir them together. Next, dump two empty tomato cans’ worth of water into the pot (feel free to use an equivalent amount of beer if you have it on hand), add more salt and more pepper, then bump the heat up to high. Once the pot starts boiling, reduce the heat to medium and simmer. This recipe assumes that time is at a premium, therefore, I am prescribing an aggressive simmer that will reduce the liquid into the vague orbit of chili-like consistency relatively quickly. If you have the time and patience needed for a longer simmer over medium-low heat, go for it.

Simmer your chili until it thickens considerably; assuming that time is at a premium, your target consistency is somewhere along the border between a thick True Chili or stew and a soup. There will still be some liquid, but it should be reasonably thick and saucy. Taste your chili for seasoning, adding more salt if necessary. Once it’s seasoned to your liking, your chili is ready. Serve into bowls with the chili accessories of your choice. I like to top my chili with shredded cheese and diced avocado that I’ve dressed with salt and lime juice, and I like to serve it with tortilla chips. Maybe you prefer sour cream and cornbread or scallions and rice or…you get the idea. It’s chili and you’re a grownup (probably), put whatever you want on it. It’s jazz, and there are no wrong answers in jazz (except for all the wrong answers in jazz; every time some has tried to explain what leading and color tones re, my brain has tried to slide out of my nose). Do what you feel, and dig in!

Week 2 NFL Confidence Pool

It’s a stretch to say that I did well in Week 1. Almost all of my misses cost me real points, and naturally, I’d be much better off if I had successfully quarantined those misses in the lower point values. That said, while I may not have thrived in Week 1, I survived. This is not a trivial point! After losing 10 points on the Ravens on Thursday, then losing 15(!) points on the Packers on Friday, and seeing most of my picks in the early Sunday afternoon window down at halftime, I was bracing for an unmitigated disaster. Instead, I finished the weekend 10/16 and with a points percentage above 0.600, and I’m grateful for it. Modest success is still success.

But I cannot deny that mistakes were made, and that the onus is upon me to clean up those mistakes. I had no business putting 15 points on a game being played in Sao Paulo, Brazil. That had never happened before! My understanding is the field was in abominable condition, and international games are always chaotic. Somehow, I tricked myself into thinking I had outsmarted entropy itself through embracing wholesale Eagles disrespect; I also ignored the warnings of the ball knowers, who had expressed extreme doubt about the Packers’ defense. It’s difficult to be this open about this act of blustering ignorance, but in my defense the Packers defense is always disappointing.

But save for the Packers’ catastrophe, my only other double-digit loss was on the Ravens. The 10-point slot exists for heavyweight battles between closely matched contenders. If you wanna berate me on the grounds that I obviously should’ve picked the Chiefs, go for it, but know that I won’t listen. Losing 10 points on a game like this is my system working as intended, and the Ravens only lost by actual inches. Yes, I lost 9 points on the Bengals, but I had penciled them in for 15 points initially before I thought better of it. I can assure you a lot of people lost a lot of points on that game, specifically, and if you were smart like me, you lost fewer points than the herd. That’s nice, right?

Week 2 is easier to pick, and I’m cautiously optimistic. We are blessed to have actual mismatches to exploit, and we are blessed to have actual data on each team instead of speculation and projection. I now know that the Eagles and Cowboys deserve actual respect, and that the Browns can eat shit for all of eternity. I know that Kirk Cousins isn’t actually recovered from his Achilles tear, and I know that the Jets are frauds. And, perhaps most importantly, I know I absolutely must not assign any amount of points on the Panthers, even as a goof. Still, I must stress the continued need for caution in Week 2. The picture of this season has begun to emerge, but that process has only just begun.

Time to make some picks!

The Bengals are a mess and will be regarded as such until they right the ship, and you do not need me to point out that the Chiefs are the exact opposite of a get right opponent. Their offensive firepower is improved as advertised, and their defense remains as advertised. It is a mistake to write of Caleb Williams after one bad game, but it is wise to assume that, on the road and under the bright lights, Williams will give the nation another game of bozo ball. None of his issues are gonna get fixed in a single week. It is wise to further assume that the Texans won’t give the Bears half as many mistakes to exploit as the Titans did. On the plus side for Bears fans, now the Bears have a quarterback who panics and drifts to his left when the play breaks down, so…progress?

I don’t think Lions/Bucs is a mismatch, exactly, but I have no trouble believing that the Commanders’ defense was as bad as everyone said it was, and the Lions’ secondary looks like it’s better than last year’s. They can handle business, which is a weird thing to say about the Deee-Troit Fucking Lions, but it’s true. I’m the Colts this week for the inverse reason; I don’t trust them with 12 points in a vacuum, but without Jordan Love the Packers are nothing. Josh Jacobs is toast, the defense is puke, and did you see how Will Levis did last week? Malik Willis is worse than that, by a lot. While Love is out, do not pick the Packers for any reason, and give their opponent as many points as you can stomach.

The Broncos suck on toast and I was tempted to go higher, since a proven ability to torture lesser quarterbacks is the Steelers’ only recognizable skill. But I’ve been severely punished each and every time I’ve given Pittsburgh double digits this decade, so they get nine and will thank me for it. This Cowboys assignment is another hedge. Both the Cowboys and Saints are coming off of horse-whippings of teams so shitty, their own level of quality is hard to assess. So, just as it was with the Rams, my play is to pick the team the vibes tell me is better, then hedge on the assignment. The same goes for the Bills pick, which I’m giving fewer points due to the doubly whammy of division rivalry chaos and Thursday chaos.

I make no secret of my Kirk Cousins hatred, which was formed from years of him watching him play on two healthy legs, but I need the Eagles to prove their worth. I’m pleased to hear that the Jets may stink outright, but surely they can beat the sorry-ass Titans? Maybe? I couldn’t tell ya. I’ve heard so much about the fucking Jets – who, as a reminder, haven’t been actually relevant to the NFL since Obama’s first term – that I skipped Monday night entirely to beat Final Fantasy VII Remake. I have no illusions that one guy skipping a primetime game in protest can make a difference, but at least I didn’t have to watch the Jets. From what little I saw of Jaguars/Dolphins neither team was terribly impressive, but fuck the Browns for all eternity. To quote Jay-Z, you made your bed, now sleep. Fuck you and fuck your rapist quarterback.

This is sub-vibes based analysis here, of course, and I am not even advising anyone except my fellow purple drink chuggers to pick the Vikings at all. But I will say that, if you must pick the 49ers, hedge the assignment. Picking the 49ers is understandable and sensible, but the Vikings probably are better than you think. They have great pass protection (pass rush is the Giants’ one theoretical strength, and it was all but neutralized last Sunday), a functional running game thanks to Aaron Jones, and a defense that looked actually good at best, impossibly annoying to deal with at worst. And this was with Brian Flores mostly rushing four! You can be certain he’ll reach deeper into his bag of tricks this week. Also, CMC isn’t likely to play; I’m told Jordan Mason looked good on Monday, but that’s still a major setback. Don’t give the 49ers double digits! Pick them by all means, but do so with extreme caution!

Briefly, before I wrap up: I’m going to be out of town for most of this next week; there will be a Gross Football Lunch next Thursday, but I will almost certainly need to take at least a few shortcuts to get it done. Expect a truncated column.

Enjoy the games, everybody!