Holy Chili batman.

[mudnuri]

just found this recipe

calls for 9lbs of ground beef etc... makes 14-17 quarts.

What exactly would you do with it all? Can you freeze chili? I cant imagine...I dont even think I have a pot big enough...wow...even my lobster pot might not be able to handle all that food...8 medium onions, 8 medium bell peppers? 18 cups of crushed tomato stuff?

Oi, we'd be eating chili for months

Brandy

 

[AdventurerKat]

My mom freezes chili all the time. But 9lbs of meat??? That is ALOT of chili meat.

 

[becka]

Can you just cut the recipe in half and you would still have plenty of chili for a long time. I love chili but even 1/2 that recipe would last us a long time.

 

[PrincessKitty1]

DH just made and froze a bit vat of chili, but not 14-17 quarts! That would be for a school or church camping trip, I think.

 

[laurie31]

We also freeze chilli, but wow, that's a TON of chili!!

We like the kind that takes all day to make, so we make as much as we can at once and then freeze it in quart ziploc bags. We lay them flat to freeze and they thaw pretty quickly. It's nice to take out a bag and have a cup of hot chili in just a few minutes

Laurie

 

[mudnuri]

We also freeze chilli, but wow, that's a TON of chili!!

We like the kind that takes all day to make, so we make as much as we can at once and then freeze it in quart ziploc bags. We lay them flat to freeze and they thaw pretty quickly. It's nice to take out a bag and have a cup of hot chili in just a few minutes

Laurie

do you just thaw the bag in the fridge then throw it in a pot and simmer?

I'm makin chili tomorow- not that big of a batch, but i've never frozen it

Brandy

 

[clh2]

We also freeze chili every time we make it. We also use the 1 qt freezer bags, since that is about what our family eat on a subsequent night.

We usually just toss it in the microwave to heat it up.

 

[bicker]

We typically make about 6-8 quarts of chili at a time. Refrigerating and reheating chili, we find, enhances the flavor of the chili, so typically we deliberately make the chili a day or two before we plan to eat it. It's one of the few foods that is NOT best fresh.

Freezing after refrigerating and then defrosting in the refrigerator seems to have no positive or negative impact -- it's just as good as if it were simply refrigerated and reheated. Freezing without refrigerating first degrades the chili to some extent. Defrosting on the kitchen counter may not be a smart idea, health-wise, but we haven't noticed that it degrades the chili substantially. Reheating the chili while still frozen substantially damages the chili, and should be avoided.