Chili Cook-off and Aikido???

I had something else clever to write about, but for the life of me I can't remember what it was.

This past Sunday was the neighborhood Chili cook-off. I was determined to make a good showing, but I really didn't know which recipe would be different enough from what everyone else would bring. Susan told me about Nigella's Chocolate Chip Chili (link). I was a little iffy on it at first but after reading the recipe a few times I warmed up to it. If we had a charged camera battery there would be a picture, but it did look a lot like the picture from the link above. I did make a few modifications to the recipe, because I like to personalize all of my dishes. :D Modifications: substitute one of the kidney bean cans with a black beans, instead of 1 tsp red pepper flakes I used 1/2 tsp of habanero pepper flakes (from my old garden), I deveined the fresh red pepper in addition to deseeding (that was a mistake, I lost a lot of heat that the habs didn't backfill - dammit). Anyway I thought it had great flavor after 3 hours in the oven (I love my oven). Susan found a 5Qt crock pot for $15 (now that's love), that I poured all of the goodness into and took it to the cook-off.

There were about 10 entries of varying quality. I believe I tried them all and could honestly say that mine was the best. There were no duplicates, which I found very interesting: Cincy, NY, Texas, Scottish (it really missed the mark of all of the entries - you don't just pour a bottle of chili power over meat and call it Chili), vegetarian, etc. With 40+ people at the party there was obviously something for everyone, because each chili got at least 2 votes. I've always had a hard time voting for my own entry so I voted for the vegetarian chili - because I thought it was the bravest entry. So you can guess what happened, right? There was a 3 way tie for first: mine and 2 others (I can't remember which ones). If I had just voted for myself I would have won outright, lol. I sent Susan up to get the award: a Christmas candle; no idea what the others got.

Last night I decided to give one of the local Aikido dojos a go to see what it was like. I had observed one of the classes and was less than super impressed, but its always hard to tell until you actually get on the mat. I was not disappointed in my original appraisal. I don't know exactly what they were doing, but it wasn't any aikido that I had ever seen/done before. I'm not sure what it was to be honest - the teaching instructor (not the head sensei) said they were "big circle, but linear". Really? Because it looks like it was "run into each other and don't bother with joint control aikido". My spider senses were lit-up when I was at the front desk signing up and the discussion turned to one of the students tearing an ACL while practicing. They all agreed that they had never heard of that before - hmmmmmm, I have - none of it first hand, but it always had to do with careless or cruel instructors (two sides of the same coin, IMHO). I do know how they could help most of their problems (funny they didn't ask, though :P); how about start having people learn techniques from kihon (static) instead of everything from ki no nagare. Hmmmm? The instructor kept saying everyone was clashing, so what would be a cure for that? More of the same? Yep. AHHHHH! (Which reminds me - its a lonely existence when you are the only one kiai-ing) Looks like I'll be shelving that hobby for the foreseeable future, but with beekeeping, cycling, kayaking, and cooking; it would have been tough to fit it all in anyway.

Speaking of cooking, I've just started reading Julia Child's My life in France. I am completely devouring the book during all of my free time (and Susan's for translating the French for me - otherwise I have to find an online translator, which isn't as good). Its more of an interactive exercise because of the translation issues and looking up the regions, wines, food terms I don't know, etc. Susan and I have talked about doing a bike tour of France this spring and I am really looking forward to it.