This time of year is great for warm and hearty meals like soups and stews. Many people enjoy chili, and there are as many recipes as there are people who make it. Have you ever considered sharing your personal flair for creating chili as a gift…without giving your specific secrets away? It is another creative and inexpensive gift that you can share that is definitely personal to you, and can warm the hearts (and bellies) of your friends.
Here’s how . . . .
You can start in your own kitchen if you have mason jars or other specialty jars. Most grocery stores sell mason jars, and they are also available at craft stores. One benefit of craft stores is that you can find different designer jars and bottles with narrow to wide mouths - and you can add a lot of personal flair to the container in which you place your dry ingredients.
Not everyone makes chili with beans. This idea can still work for them, too. I prefer to make my chili with beans, and in the gift jar they look so attractive - so whether YOU make chili with beans, the person to whom you give this gift will have the choice based upon his or her preference to include or exclude the beans. Plus, depending on what type of beans you use, the pattern at the bottom of the jar can be very pretty.
The next level up is the dry spices. These are very personalized, depending on how you make your chili. In a small bowl, mix together the dry spices that you would normally use to make your chili. For example, I use a combination of chili powder, crushed red pepper, paprika, cumin, dry minced garlic, dry minced onion, and celery salt. Mix these spices well, and carefully pour them into a small ziplock bag. If you use sweet and salty spices like I do, then I would keep those two types of seasonings separated in two different plastic bags.
These are the basics of dry chili ingredients. Likely, there will still be an empty third of a mason jar. The third layer can be filled with the dry ingredients for cornbread, also in a plastic bag, of course.
This type of gift does not have to be chili, though that is one of my favorite autumn and winter foods to make and share. Various types of soup ingredients can be gifted in this manner, with the top third of the jar containing dry ingredients for bread or biscuits.
If you choose to make a gift basket, which is a very nice idea that has many opportunities for creative outlet, you can add soup bowls, a fresh onion or red bell pepper (if you plan to give the gift in person directly). Other nice finishing touches, whether to the jar itself or to a basket, can be a large bottle of tabasco sauce, a cloth napkin, or other similar complementary items. Remember, of course, to include the instructions for how to cook the chili or soup - with the remaining ingredients listed and specific directions. Remember to include instructions on how to soak and cook dry beans - you never know if the recipient of this kind of gift knows how to do that. If you include dry ingredients for bread or biscuits, ensure that you have the instructions for that also.
I personally enjoy making and giving this gift because I almost always have the items to put in the mason jars on hand. I keep dry beans always because they are practical, inexpensive, healthy, and they go a long way. The amount of seasonings in soups and chilis varies from person to person, and from recipe to recipe, but if you keep the proportion to a 4-person family (a cup of dry beans to a pot), then the spice section of the jar is going to be nominal. The components of these types of gifts are all raw cooking materials, so they are inexpensive and easy to replace - and quickly.
A suggested tip for aesthetics and ease of access is to separate each section of the jar with a small piece of wax paper. This serves two purposes. First, it looks pretty, especially if you use decorative wax paper. Second, if for whatever reason, the plastic bags containing either the seasonings or the bread ingredients breaks during the packing process, the ingredients won’t get mixed in with the other sections of the jar.
A note about the top section of the jar, where the dry ingredients for the bread are — if you are including ingredients for a yeast-based bread, do NOT add the yeast directly. Just include a single pouch of unopened dry yeast.
A nice finishing touch after closing the jar, and using whatever cute little cloth mason topper (between the seal and the lid), is to put the recipes on tri-folded paper (card stock, so as not to tear easily). The instructions for soaking and cooking the beans are on the first third; the list of remaining ingredients and instructions for cooking the chili or soup is in the second (middle) third; and the list of remaining ingredients and instructions for baking the bread are on the final third. This paper is tri-folded with a Christmas label used to seal it. With a small corner hole-punched (carefully, to make sure that the hole-punch does not impede reading), a tie of some sort is used to attach the card/instructions to the mason jar. You can use ribbon, corn straw, whatever suits you.
