So for Super Bowl Sunday, we stayed home which is how I like it–primarily because I’m a football purist and like to focus on the game. But hey, I’m a foodie so made some good food too. My wife has been doing something similar to South Beach Diet, and so we kept things relatively healthy and low-carb. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be tasty. We made Andrew Zimmern’s Asian wings that I have covered on here before, South Beach Texas Bowl o Red which is basically beef chunks in a thick chili sauce, and Mark Bittman’s Black Bean Soup from a Men’s Health Magazine. I could not find that online, but here is a version of Bittman’s that is close.

This new show “The Taste” on ABC looks pretty cool. It’s essentially a food version of “The Voice,” with big names like Anthony Bourdain and Ludo Lefebvre and Nigella Lawson–the judges have to taste a spoonful of food prepared by someone that they don’t know is a home cook or a professional. And it looks like it has a big budget set. My wife and I barely got through the long 2-hour premiere, but it’s definitely a show that looks like it will be worth watching.

Have you guys noticed food prices going up? I have not researched this but man, it seems like simple things that were $4.99 a year ago are $6.99 now. Or maybe I’m imagining things.

Man, speaking of food, it’s dinner time and I’m hungry. See ya!

When I was growing up, I learned much of my basic cooking skills from my mom and brother. I also learned a lot on my own when I was diagnosed with high cholesterol at the age of 20, and began diving into healthy eating books and cookbooks–hence I had to learn how to make myself healthy lunches and such. I continued learning by reading and then by watching Food Network as that evolved. But I never took a formal cooking class until this past summer, when I enrolled in a 3-session course at Madison Area Technical College (MATC) on Thai cooking. I love Thai food, but it’s not easy to learn how to make real curry without having an instructor show you how it’s made from scratch, rather than by opening a jar of curry paste. I also learned how to make a real spring roll, and also pad thai, among other things.

I liked the course and instructor so much, that I took another course recently through MATC–same instructor, different location, and this time it was a 2-session course on making soup from scratch. I already knew how to do this, but the course taught me things I did not know, and it also was great to see how you make amazing chicken stock from scratch to start out. From there you can make, as we did, chicken noodle soup and wonton soup. The second session, we made chili and cream of mushroom soup. The latter is something I’ve never made, but it was phenomenal and I can’t wait to make it at home.

Then last week I received a James Beard cookbook and will be covering that in the Bullz-Eye.com Holiday Gift Guide. But this past weekend, I had to sample some of the recipes, which meant actually following the recipes of a master, and I learned so much in making just a couple of recipes from that book–gruyere soup; and beef Bourguignon saute. The latter involved making a sauce from scratch and making that the base–and learning how to do that was worth the price of the book, even though I didn’t technically pay for the book. That sauce was amazing and my mouth is watering just thinking about it. And it was SO easy. Of course, these recipes use crazy amounts of butter, but that’s why they taste so good, and because they are so rich, you can’t overeat. I also learned that by mixing flour and butter together, you can use that to thicken a sauce (cornstarch what?).

What’s my point? You can always learn more, especially with cooking, in which there are so many cuisines, methods and different foods out there in 2012. And I can’t wait to dive into that James Beard book some more.

The weather outside in most of the country is chilly, and in Wisconsin it’s downright cold. I think I might make a giant pot of chili this weekend. We fired up the slow cooker this past week to make one of my favorite meals, beef burgundy. The one we made is from an old cookbook and includes beef, mushrooms, onion soup mix, cream of mushroom soup, cream of celery soup and red wine. That’s about it. But to help you out, check out this Google search for beef burgundy, which basically is a beef stew made with some sort of red wine.

So what about you? What do you like to make when the weather gets cold, football season is in full swing, fires are raging in your living room, and you’re out shoveling snow, cross country skiing or out Christmas shopping, and want something hot to eat. Man, I’m getting hungry.

I have to admit, by the time September hits, and there is a chill in the air, I’m ready to stop grilling and making salads and gazpacho and ready to start cooking stick-to-you-ribs meals like chili and stew and roasts. One of the reasons I was excited about moving to Wisconsin last year was for the earlier changing of the season from that of Nashville. Of course, there is the down side to that–i.e. early and lots-of-it snow. But we have some time before that happens (well, hopefully we do). And the warmer fall has been a mild bummer in a cooking sense, because who wants to make stew when it’s 80 degrees outside, as it was the first week to 10 days of the month here in Madison. Something is wrong with that picture, but I’m no climate scientist.

As I write this, however, it’s a brisk 60-ish with temps dropping into the low 40’s tonight. It’s stew time, and I’ve got a beef stew on the stove. I’m not making the one I posted here last year, but a new recipe I found in a magazine. But I have to tell you guys, I re-visited my chili recipe last week during a football Sunday (the beef one), and it came out way better than it ever has before. I think the key was just to let it thicken naturally, but either way I felt pretty good about that recipe, admittedly better than the first time I made it and created the recipe.

I’m also looking forward to re-visiting casseroles and mac & cheese like this one. I also want to give another go-round with this Buffalo chicken mac I saw in the Food Network magazine recently. Man, was that amazing. Oh, and don’t forget about soup. Maybe I need to make new soups a priority this year–dude soup. Yeah, that’s it.

It’s time once again for Hot Dog Friday! Here is a recipe for a basic chili dog that we published last year on Grub for Guys. Enjoy!

If done right, nothing beats a good chili dog. But if you use the wrong kind of chili, or cheese or even dog, it can easily get messed up. So here is our take on a classic….

Ingredients
4 all-beef hot dogs
4 hot dog buns
Yellow mustard
1 small can Hormel chili without beans (avoid so-called “hot dog sauce,” which is all mashed up beans and fillers)
½ cup sharp cheddar cheese, finely shredded

Directions
Cook the dogs, either boiling them on the stovetop for 10 minutes, or grilling on a preheated medium heat grill for about 5 minutes, turning frequently to avoid burning. Meanwhile, put chili in a microwave safe bowl and nuke for about 45 seconds on high. Assemble dogs by putting each in a bun and topping evenly with a squirt of mustard, the chili and the cheese.