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Happy Monday everyone,
I wanted to get the end of the street food series posted today since I missed it this weekend. I got so busy that I did not have enough time to post. Also the world just keeps slipping further and further down and it’s honestly so disheartening. Like, does what we do really matter?
It really seems that the more that you stand up for the good, the more you get knocked down and the more that things out of your control hit you. It’s absolutely infuriating to look around and see how terrible it really is. What can we do? I keep will doing what I do, but it really seems just fruitless sometimes.
Oh we have a few things up on our wishlist now to help with the show and the blog. Most of them are crowd funding so that hopefully we can actually get it done, because most of these will help us out immensely! You can find it here!
To really talk about street food in America, we need to pay homage to the fact that America is HUGE. We have North America, Central America, and South America. The first time that we really see street food in the Americas is during Aztec times. They would have markets basically ‘selling’ dried and preserved foods to people in their communities or people who were traveling through.
Unfortunately we do not have a lot of records on everything that was sold because in the conquest of Spain in the Americas in the last 1400s mostly every record that the Aztecs kept were destroyed and they were killed by the Europeans.
in the 1700s and 1800s Europeans would set up food stalls at the docks to sell to people who were traveling or sailing. Most of these things were seafoods, preserved food, or food they brought with them from their own cultures.
In the 1800s in some Free-Cities in Southern States, Black Women made a living from selling their wares, but this is where things start to go south, in the worst way possible.
White Eurocentric men did NOT like that Black Women were being paid for their work and paid decent living from the amazing dishes that they were making and selling. They started some regulation. Women, Black people, and Immigrants were largely not allowed to have food businesses during this time; either by laws or by regulations that would pretty much push them out. Many of these women had their businesses, foods, and recipes stolen from them to just be lazily recreated by white men in restaurants that cost most people way too much.
If you go to Texas in the mid to late 1800s and early 1900s you see this happen to Mexican and Indigenous Women who were creating the first chilis that we know today. They were completely ran out by red tape. (And some of these rules still exist today)
For a long time there was propaganda about street food being dirty, especially because it was mostly women, Black People, and Immigrants who owned the stalls. So many people stayed away from the food for a very long time. It was not until the Food Truck surge in the mid 2000s (when street food became ‘Royalty’ food) that we see food trucks having a big uptick and street food being enjoyed by more people, but because of the regulations, that as a restaurant chef I can tell you, are not needed because restaurants don’t even have most of these regulations, most of the people who brought street food to us are still not really allowed in the space.
We are doing a chili today and the most that I have to say about this recipe is that you really need to have patience with it. If you don’t have time; put it in the Instant Pot for 30 minutes after you saute the onions, peppers, garlic, and meat.
Chili
Items Needed
Chef’s knife
Spatula
Large stock pot
Measuring cup and spoons
Ingredients Needed
2 tbs butter
1 lb beef
1 orange bell pepper; diced
1 yellow onion; diced
6 cloves garlic; minced
4 tomatoes; diced
2 cans of Kidney Beans
5 cups of water
3 tbs of chicken or beef bouillon
1 can tomato sauce
3 tbs chili powder
2 tbs cumin
2 tbs paprika
1 tbs brown sugar
1 tbs instant coffee
1 tbs garlic powder
Salt and Pepper (I use 2 tbs salt and 1 tbs pepper)
Recipe
In a stock pot over a medium high heat, add your butter; onions, bell pepper, and garlic and saute for about 4 minutes
Add your beef, cook until fully browned, about 4-5 minutes
Add in the rest of the ingredients and bring up to a boil
Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 2 hours; if too much water is gone just add a little water at a time
If want to ask questions or be a part of a community that LOVES talking food and coming up with a lot of new ways to eat, join our discord!
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We will be back on Wednesday with another Super Animal Royal cookbook recipe!
-momnoms
Thank you guys for this amazing journey! Don’t forget to go to the Cooking Show to see us cook everything live and to talk about the history of the food! You can also follow us on Youtube in order to see the reruns that are attached to the blog!