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Posts tagged food

Andy:
from "Take Bacon. Add Sausage. Blog.," by Damon Darlin, NYTimes.com, 27 January 2009

Where once homegrown recipes were disseminated in Ann Landers columns or Junior League cookbooks, new media have changed — and greatly accelerated — the path to popularity. Few recipes have cruised down this path as fast or as far as the Bacon Explosion, and this turns out to be no accident. One of its inventors works as an Internet marketer, and had a sophisticated understanding of how the latest tools of promotion could be applied to a four-pound roll of pork.

The Bacon Explosion was born shortly before Christmas in Roeland Park, Kan., in Jason Day’s kitchen. He and Aaron Chronister, who anchor a barbecue team called Burnt Finger BBQ, were discussing a challenge from a bacon lover they received on their Twitter text-messaging service: What could the barbecuers do with bacon? . . .

Mr. Chronister explained that the Bacon Explosion “got so much traction on the Web because it seems so over the top.” But Mr. Chronister, an Internet marketer from Kansas City, Mo., did what he could to help it along. He first used Twitter to send short text messages about the recipe to his 1,200 Twitter followers, many of them fellow Internet marketers with extensive social networks. He also posted links on social networking sites. “I used a lot of my connections to get it out there and to push it,” he said.

by Andy Crouch for Culture Making

Chapter four of Culture Making begins with a description of our family’s chili—and has prompted several requests for the recipe. Ask and you shall receive . . . after a brief check to make sure that posting recipes isn’t an infringement of copyright (turns out it’s complicated, and actually a very interesting example of culture at work . . . ).

This receipe is adapted from the terrific cookbook Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home, where they call it “Red, Gold, Black, and Green Chili”:

1/2 cup bulghur
1/2 cup hot water
28-ounce can of canned tomatoes, undrained

Bring the bulghur, hot water, and about 1 c. of juice from the can of tomatoes to a boil in a small saucepan, then simmer until the bulghur is cooked.

3 Tbsp olive or vegetable oil
3 cups chopped onions
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 Tbsp Tabasco or other hot pepper sauce (we omit this—our kids would really go crazy!)

Sauté these ingredients together until the onions are soft.

2 green bell peppers, chopped

Add the bell peppers and sauté for 2-3 minutes. Chop the tomatoes right in the can and add them to the pan.

2 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels
1 1/2 cups drained cooked black beans (14-ounce can)
1 1/2 cups drained cooked red kidney beans (14-ounce can)

Stir in the corn and beans, and heat thoroughly on low heat.

Add the cooked bulghur, simmer for a few minutes longer, and salt if necessary.

We always top this with grated cheddar cheese.

Enjoy!