Recipe Saturday 3!

This will take almost as long to type as it does to make:

1 pound lean ground beef (Costco is my fav)
1 pound Jimmy Dean Sage sausage
2 cans red kidney beans
2 cans tomato sauce
1 package Williams chili seasoning

I put my tomato sauce and the chili seasoning into a 5 quart pan, open the beans and rinse them in the can 'til they quit "foaming", then add them to the sauce which is heats while I cook the meat...

I mix the beef and sausage together and fry it most of the way done as a patty so I can drain the grease off several times while I cook it, then crumble it towards the end. I also get a bit more of the grease out by lining a colander with 6 layers of paper towel and dumping the skillet into it, then using 4 more paper towels to press the grease out of it, so it soaks into the towels. Then I put the meat into the pan with the sauce. Usually it's a bit too thick so I use about a 1/2 can of water (using one of the sauce cans) until it's the thickness I like.

We are salt addicts, so usually a couple of tablespoons have found their way into the sauce as well. Sometimes some diced onions as well...

When Dad moved into supervision for Milgram he was in charge of the meat counters in 18 stores, and had to start attending meetings and business lunches and such. One of the first ones he ever told us about was when Jimmy Dean came to Kansas City to get Milgram's to carry his sausage; it was him who told Dad about adding it to chili. Back then it was just regular sausage (also works great in a meatloaf). When the sage sausage came out, that was absolutely the perfect complement to the chili seasonings, and has been "the family recipe" ever since.

alan