Origins of chili con carne

[satx78247]

Most New Mexico food is actually Native American with Navaho, Zuni, Hopi, Papago, Apache & other tribal influences, plus some influences from Spain & Mexico.

NM food is REALLY different from Mexican, Spanish or Texas food & it is quite well-liked on our side of the state line, too.

yours, satx

 

[kansas_volunteer]

In Korea you can see masses of big red chili's drying on rooftops after picking. They appear to be New World chili's, so are probably more or less the same red chili's used in chili con carne. So, is Korean beef cooked with the red chili's just another variation of American chili con carne?

I make my chili con carne with beans, but I use different varieties to add a little color to the devil's brew. And, oh forfend! I also add some yellow hominy, also for color, and because corn and beans belong together.

 

[Black Hand]

There are an estimated 50,000 varieties of peppers...

 

[tenngun]

SOME kinds of peppers are from The New World. - Southern Asia has had native (and mostly quite small & EXTREMELY hot) peppers in their cuisine for many centuries.

yours, satx

I'm thinking those Asian peppers are descended from pepper the spanish introduced there an sixteenth century. About the same time that they introduced peppers to New Mexico. None of the precolumbian sites have remains of peppers or tomatoes before the arrival of the Spanish.

 

[Vaino]

I love chili con carne and it's made often and 3 varieties of beans are always used. Chili w/o beans is a sauce and to my way of thinking should be put on something, whereas chili w/ beans is a complete meal. Chili w/o beans reminds me of a differently flavored spaghetti sauce which is always put on pasta. Could it be that chili w/o beans was smeared on tortillas?

The article was very interesting.....Fred

 

[BillinOregon]

I find hominy a welcome addition to many stews -- and it is the star of a big pot of posole. Yum!

 

[omarick1948]

I love chili con carne and it's made often and 3 varieties of beans are always used. Chili w/o beans is a sauce and to my way of thinking should be put on something, whereas chili w/ beans is a complete meal. Chili w/o beans reminds me of a differently flavored spaghetti sauce which is always put on pasta. Could it be that chili w/o beans was smeared on tortillas?

The article was very interesting.....Fred

In Mexican cooking, peppers from the garden or wherever are commonly called "Chili's".
Sauces or other condiments using them as a base are referred to as "Chili". That small container or bowl of sauce at your table at a Mexican cafe is a condiment sauce. Chili con carne is a meal not to be confused with the soupy stew we all have had with crackers.

There probably are 50,000 types of peppers and probably even more recipes and versions of Chili con carne.

 

[crockett]

I've done the thing from scratch. I can only get dried "New Mexican" peppers and they don't quite have the taste I want, I need some other variety. I probably use about 7 and cook down to a red sauce along with cumin and oregano. There is supposed to be a Mexican oregano that is actually another plant but I can't find any.
I fry chunks of beef. The fried drippings seem to add to the taste so I fry the beef in another pan and then add the red sauce. I like beans so I add some small red beans. I get the dry and soak them overnight. I make a big batch and freeze half of it. I don't use any tomatoes and I don't think the original recipe used them. I have also thickened it with masa corn flour if needed. I usually have some type of corn tortilla so it goes well. I put raw chopped onions in it on top. Queso blanco now and then.
The peppers from the Hatch Valley are supposed to be the "best". I can only get them once in a while. Hey....maybe that justifies a trip to Gila National Forest, stop on the way back to load up on the peppers.
Most of the ingredients can actually be packed into a place without refrigeration and cooked in a dutch oven, etc.- PC

 

[satx78247]

Presuming that the archeologists from Bangkok, Thailand are correct, there are remains of pepper seeds/plants in recovered relics that predate the Spanish/Portuguese "discovery" of Asia by at least 1,000 years.
(My theory is that there was a LOT of "back & forth" trading between what is now near Pondicherry, India (across Berengia) & "The New World" for perhaps 2-20,000 years.)

Note: Wouldn't it be ironic that we NA, who were called "Indians" by Columbus, were actually descended from people who once populated India??

yours, satx

 

[tenngun]

I believe in lots of precolumbian contact. Oceans are a hiway not a block, so it could sure be. Carbonized peanuts have been found in Indonesia, and that to is an American plant. ... tons of mysteries.

 

[satx78247]

Given that the continent Berenga is known to have existed, the traders walked from Asia to NA on dry land for many centuries.
(Berenga is believed to have sunk after a group of massive earthquakes. - The author of AMERICAN DAWN: Toward an Understanding of Ancient America says that he seriously doubts that NA ever knew that they had traveled from what is now south/southeast Asia to North America. He believes that numerous islands, including all of the Philippines, Malaysia, Japan & Indonesia, were once mountaintops.)

yours, satx

 

[satx78247]

Also, one of the Egyptian Pharoahs, whose mummy is in The British Museum, was found to have consumed coca & chocolate shortly before his death, so there must have been at least some Trans-Atlantic trade between Africa & The New World quite early.

yours, satx

 

[tenngun]

I will have to find that and read it. Even back to ice age west European points show up in south east coast, pre Clovis although similar.

 

[tenngun]

And stone heads and faces carved looking like European oor African and Asian. Often the story of trans Atlantic travel is presented as a two to tree month voyage, when from Egypt to Mexico you can sail with out being more then a few days out of sight of land.

 

[Nativearizonan]

Polynesians are thought to have introduced chickens to South America, and sweet potatoes to Asia. They found Hawaii and Easter Island in the middle of the Pacific, several centuries before Columbus. I doubt they had any trouble finding two whole continents. They could easily have brought peanuts, corn, chili peppers, tobacco, cocaine and etc back to the old world. So could many of others that had seafaring lifestyles. The Vikings are another proven example. The Phoenicians, the Moors, the Chinese, the Japanese, the Egyptians, the Irish, and even the Romans, all these and many others probably visited this side of the globe at least accidentally now and then..

 

[tenngun]

Ayup, French explorers showed up in Mandan villages before 1650, and they showed up to trade in Qubec a few years. I have to chuckle at those who say junks would have run out of water and sank crossing the pacific or been eaten by worms. Sailing north along Japan Kamchatka then to Alaska down the coast, plenty to eat, drink and trade with. A ship a horse two feet and a woodsman ship the world awaited any place he wanted to go.

 

[Gene L]

I think the cocaine thing is an urban myth, as it (and probably chocolate) were recovered from the skin, since all the internals were removed from mummies during embaming. And cocaine useage was prevalent enough to leave trace amounts in the age of the discovery of mummies back in the late 19th century.

I like chili maybe once a year. Not a huge Mexican food fan.

Thor whatsisname proved a reed boat COULD sail to the new world, but he barely made it with modern navigation methods...modern back in the 50s.

But, for example, the boards of Egyptian ships were more or less tied together with ropes, not nails. Making cross-continent trade less likely.

 

[tenngun]

Thor Heyerdahl tried to take the Ra straight across the atlantic, at least showed it was possible :idunno: I think it took him six weeks or more. A better route with a primitive craft is north to Britain, then along the north sea island, off to Iceland following the birds, then to Greenland, south to labador. Along that route one is never more then a week off land.
Ships bound with rope are very seaworthy as they flex and roll with the ocean. Arab trade across the indian ocean was done with ship sewn together well up to modern times. Coconut fiber ropes painted with coconut oil was the binding cord.
Phoenicians working for the Egyptians had circumnavigated Africa.
Tim Severin sailed the leather boat the Brendan from Ireland to America, also a vessel just sewn together.
Polynesians found smaller pieces of land in a much harsher ocean. Modren navigation can give a degree of accuracy undreamed of in the past. But the men back then learned the stars and to follow birds, they could even tell land was in such and such direction by reading rebound waves. The mythology of a land in the west was old hat to Homer. Trade would not have been practical, but contact is another story.

 

[Dale Lilly]

Wow! I spent a lot of years in Texas and New Mexico and nearly seven years in Mexico [living there]. I just received an education. Thanks guys. Dale

 

[user 53891]

To help confuse things, in New Mexico, chili is a condiment, not a dish. (I do like a NM green chili cheeseburger).

Nothing like a Mexican breakfast burrito smothered in green chili...mmmmm. Bob & earls in Trinidad, Co. is owned by a gal from Guatemala....the best.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guatemala​