Comfort Food - Chili / Cheese Boxes / Sour Cream Salad / Dutch Apple Pecan Pie

So it snowed yesterday! Only in the mountains, but still . . . . I even turned on the furnace this morning. Perfect weather for soup. I let Caryn choose which soup recipe to use and she chose the chili. This is the easiest chili recipe and very good. I used to make it in the olden days. Well, turns out that Campbell's has since discontinued one of the ingredients, so I had to improvise. At least I think they did - I went to two stores and couldn't find the chili beef soup. So I found a Progresso's Three Bean Chili with Beef. It worked find, but I probably would use less water next time since this is not a concentrated soup. So here's the recipe:

CHILI
1 lb. ground beef
1 chopped onion
1/2 cup green pepper
1 clove garlic minced
1 tbsp. chili powder
1 can tomato soup
1½ soup cans water
1 can chili beans
1 cup shredded cheese
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cans Campbell's chili beef soup
Serves 10.

To go with the chili, I decided to make a bread recipe. I chose Cheese Boxes because Doug wasn't here to complain about the cheese. I remember Mother making these yummy boxes. I bought French bread. Seems like when she made them, she went to Albertson's and bought their bakery bread and asked for it unsliced. The French bread worked well, though. It's messy - I used two forks to roll the boxes in the corn flake crumbs. To toast them, I put them on my broiler pan and broiled on low.

CHEESE BOXES
Cut unsliced bread into cubes. Spread with Cheese Whiz and roll in cornflakes (optional). Put in oven and toast.

Continuing to take advantage of Doug being out of town, I decided to make a salad with sour cream. Here's an easy one, but you might want to warn your guests that it's not whipping cream on the fruit.

SOUR CREAM SALAD
1 #2 can chunk pineapple
2 small cans mandarin oranges
1/2 pkg. angel flake coconut
1/2 to 1 pkg. tiny marshmallows
1/2 pint sour cream
Combine together.

And for dessert - the perfect comfort food!

DUTCH APPLE PECAN PIE
3½ cups sliced peeled apples
1 9-inch unbaked pastry shell
1 cup sugar
5 tbsp. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 cup evaporated milk
1/4 cup water
2 tbsp. butter, melted
2 tbsp. sugar
1/8 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 cup chopped pecans
Note: If you wish to use fresh milk, use 1¼ cups milk, eliminating the water and evaporated milk.
Method: Arrange sliced apples in the unbaked pastry shell. In small mixing bowl mix together the 1 cup sugar, flour, salt, 1/4 tsp. nutmeg, evaporated milk, water and butter. Pour over apple slices. Mix the 2 tbsp. sugar, the 1/8 tsp. nutmeg and chopped nuts and sprinkle over top of pie. Bake in preheated hot oven (425°F) for 10 minutes, reduce heat to 350°F and continue baking for about 1 hour, or until apples are tender. Cover with aluminum foil for last 35 minutes of baking. Cool. Makes 6 servings.