Chili: The easiest thing in the world to make, if you put aside the peanut butter and jam sandwich. An amalgam of tomato, meat, beans and spice, it is comfort food that warms to soul of a foreigner sick-to-death of ginger, la jiao, and small pieces of meat.

<

p class=”caption left”>
chili in a dirty kitchen

I made chili last week. It’s was not an easy process. Some things in the Middle Kingdom can be downright difficult. There is no one store that holds all the magical ingredients. Creating a pot of chili involves at least two retailers and a lot of forward planning.

Man cannot live on dumplings alone. Noodles and ever-present rice can drain the life out of you faster than a parched vampire. A pengyou and I decided to make chili, pooling our resources. The idea evolved into bacon-chili-cheese dogs. It was Sunday, after all, the only night of must-see TV in Shenzhen.
America’s Next Top Model is broadcast Sundays at 8:35 pm. I would never watch this sad excuse for television if living a North American existence. Even completely removed from this free-falling, morally-and-intellectually-suspect culture I still need nausea medication after watching Tyra Bank boost her already giant ego for 44 minutes.

Sorry, I digressed.

<

p class=”right caption”>
boost tyra’s ego: watch antm.

We moved up our plans for chili dogs to coincide with the ATM broadcast. I had kidney beans, a dusty can had been in my cupboard for seven months, waiting for batch of chili to be made. The store that sells the beans is more than an hour away by bus. You can’t pop down to the corner should you find yourself in need. Likewise, I had chili powder. A trip to Wal-Mart resulted in Tomato sauce, ground pork and other items.

There was a quick trip to our local grocery emporium and a discussion over the rack of strange breads as to which could be adapted to chili dog-dom. Hot dogs are served on a stick in China, the bun has yet to catch on. Dinner rolls, opened up, it was decided, could serve as an open-faced foundation for the chili dog creation.

I cooked the mess up and consumed it with a glee only seen on payday. It was a tasty treat. I now have a couple of bus rides to look forward to if I wish to replace my cache of beans and chili spices.