Some years ago, a Mohawk Indian from my rod and gun club married a Nipmuc woman. It was the first time people from each tribe intermarried, and they threw one heck of a wedding. There were 500 people and it lasted 3 days. Imagine half the crowd wearing traditional garb staying in canvas tents. I photographed the wedding and was asked to make venison chili. I was given a pot big enough to set up camp in. I did not have enough of anything. I put all my venison through a grinder. I use the sausage plate with the 2 big holes for coarse grinding. I had a good 50 pounds of meat browning off. I salt and pepper everything so that's in the pot. I added several #10 cans of diced tomatoes. I buy dried chili peppers, usually Anaheims and blitz them in the food processor. I put in a pound bag. I also put in a bag of garlic. I browned off a 10 pound bag of onions and put them in. I put in a bottle of oregano and about a quarter of a bottle of cumin........... I don't like a lot of cumin! I let it cook slowly for several hours and tasted it. It was bland so I went to get another bag of chili peppers.
When I was gone, some A#@ H*#@ decided to add some "piaza" to it and dumped in a bottle of hot sauce. I came back and saw him stirring the pot and if I could have lifted the big SOB, I'd have stuffed him in it. All my venison, all my money for ingredients and all my work and this $#@ who fancies himself a chili expert dumped in a bottle of hot sauce. Everyone said it was hot. I don't make hot chili. There's a bottle of hot sauce on the table. My Mom can eat my chili and that's how it should be. Flavorful, not hot! I won my club's chili cook off the one time they were brave enough to have one and beat the "expert" with the secret home ground and blended spice mix and so on so forth.
I do not like a lot of cumin in my chili. I do not like a lot of beans in my chili. I do not like diced bell peppers in my chili, and I do not like my chili hot. That's what I find I don't like about most of the chili I've had.
