Banana Chili

No, no, not banana peppers grafted onto chili peppers and grown organically. Instead, this phrase describes one of my staple large-crowd dishes (chili) combined with one of my staple methods of cooking (use up whatever is sitting in or on the fridge or freezer or countertop).

I use words like "staple" as though I cook a lot, or as though I am some sort of chef. In fact, my cooking is limited to things that I can fry in a pan or simmer for hours in a big soup pot. Sometimes I stray beyond these limitations, but not often.

Naed had, three weeks ago, given us two grocery bags of nearly dead bananas, which I quickly froze, to prevent their further decay. I believe I was hoping that a blender would appear, allowing for smoothies, or that I would become motivated to bake bread, allowing for banana bread or perhaps banana muffins or cookies. Both of these beliefs were equally foolish.

Instead, while cooking the chili (opening the stewed tomato can, opening the black beans can, opening the corn can, dumping all into the pot), I remembered that those bananas were probably going to go bad soon, even in the freezer.

I removed them, contemplating their resemblance to slugs, contemplating the delicious chili aroma in the house (having since added peppers, onions, garlic, ground beef, pepper, paprika, and salt), contemplating the impact on my bank account of having to order three or four pizzas if this went horribly awry, contemplating the appropriateness of banana chili as a concept.

After being microwaved and peeled, the bananas resembled slugs even more so than they had previous to their microwaving and peeling. Whereas previously, they had resembled garden slugs, the kind that wreck the lettuce crop and shrivel when salt is poured upon them, the bananas now resembled the kind of slugs that feature prominently in sci-fi horror movies, the kind of slugs that cause the action hero to reach for his grenades instead of his trusty laser gun, the kind of slugs that have a slug queen who instructs them, via slug gurgles, to enslave humanity.

I mashed them in a bowl with a wooden spoon and dumped them into the chili, which my guests found delicious. I told them that it was banana chili. I did not tell them about the slugs.