# Chili in a can: have you ever used it for anything but hot dogs? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 26, 2009, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543 "2009-02-26T18:51:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/41 "2009-02-26T21:32:02Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Canned tamales are part of our “camping food” kit. Nestle the can in the coals of the campfire until they are more than cold and scarf down with cheap canned beer. > > I’ve discovered that you can really perk up canned chili by not only adding more chilis, but by adding a small amount (1/8 tsp. or so) of mustard powder. Ever tried adding about a half pint of gasoline? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/42 "2009-02-26T21:35:11Z")
In chili? Nah. We just drink the stuff straight. ---
**Author:** ![Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troy_mcclure_sf/32/4150_2.png) [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/43 "2009-02-26T21:42:58Z")
Ooh… this thread is reminding me. I have a can of turkey chili, a few slices of shitty cheddar (or maybe swiss, not that it matters), and tortilla chips at home. Looks like I have dinner planned! ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/44 "2009-02-26T21:43:29Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > In chili? Nah. We just drink the stuff straight. I know I’ve veered way off topic (what’s new?) but what you said and something on TV a while ago about okra made me recall something a school chum had to say at lunch one day. He was from the country and had a thick drawl which adds to the effect when this is told out loud, but the jist of it ought to be obvious. “You got to eat peanut butter with boiled okra to put the brakes on it.” ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/45 "2009-02-26T21:45:59Z")
I hardly ever put it on hot dogs, actually. I mix the canned stuff with spaghetti, for when I’m really hungry and really lazy. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/46 "2009-02-26T21:53:31Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > Do you know how many scoville units that is? > [@Wiki](#): > > Thus a sweet pepper or a bell pepper, containing no capsaicin at all, has a Scoville rating of zero, meaning no heat detectable, even undiluted. Oh, my. This is _not_ off to a good start. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/47 "2009-02-26T23:47:10Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > My hat’s off to you, sir. Do you know how many scoville units that is? I have a bottle of Dave’s Private Reserve, which is around 750,000 IIRC, but it only comes out when I’m feeling really masochistic. It’s not listed on the bottle but according to [this site](http://www.chez-williams.com/Hot%20Sauce/hothome.htm), Mega Death comes in at about 2/3 that. As you’ll see from the same page, Blair puts out some substances with absolutley ludicrous Scoville ratings, but this is entirely sufficient for my heat needs and furthermore it is quite _tasty_. It’s truly delicious hot sauce. Somehow I doubt that some clear liquid in a hermetically sealed vial that’s 32 times as hot as this stuff is going to be described as “tasting good”. MD is 2/3 of the way down the page, down past the “weapons of mass destruction” league stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/48 "2009-02-27T02:07:36Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > I rather like Denisons Chilli (especially the hot kind), personally. Oh, I like the way my wife makes it better, but for a prepared food it’s edible enough IMHO. > > -XT I used to live on Denisons and Coke when I was a kid. Loved the stuff. Now, not so much. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/49 "2009-02-27T02:36:12Z")
> [@CaerieD](#): > > I’ve eaten it simply as chili a few times, though it’s not really “chili” in my mind, but “extra concentrated umami fat sauce” or something along those lines. Usually, it’s used for homemade chili cheese fries, though, because you _cannot_ make those properly with good chili. It’s got to be canned. +1 … it doesnt have the right flavor profile for me to eat it as chili, but it is the correct flavor profile for chili fries, or a bud uses it in potato skins for a funky tex mex potato skin. Perhaps if I was absolutely starving, and there wasnt anything else available or that i could manage to make Id eat it, but I really wouldnt be happy \* - i once spent a week living on microwave popcorn and water thanks to an intensly bad bout of pneumonia that kept me hallucinating and feverish until mrAru got home. I would have gone to the hospital in an ambulance but there would have been nobody available to take care of the livestock or house animals. ---
**Author:** ![Jodi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7feea3/32.png) [@Jodi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jodi)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/50 "2009-02-27T02:44:06Z")
I eat chili out of a can most of the time I eat chili (which honestly isn’t much). As a single person, whipping up a pot of home made chili is a PITA and means chili for a week – no thanks. I like Stagg chicken chili and Stagg turkey chili, both of which are low fat and reasonably tasty. Grate some cheddar on the top, break out a couple of whole wheat tortillas – it’s hardly the worst microwave dinner in the world. To me, asking whether people actually _eat_ canned chili is like asking if they eat canned soup. Of course we do; at least a lot of us do. I may be a troglodyte but that’s not why. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/51 "2009-02-27T02:50:09Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > - i once spent a week living on microwave popcorn and water thanks to an intensly bad bout of pneumonia that kept me hallucinating and feverish until mrAru got home. You keep a week’s worth of microwave popcorn in your house? ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/52 "2009-02-27T02:54:31Z")
> [@Jodi](#): > > To me, asking whether people actually _eat_ canned chili is like asking if they eat canned soup. Of course we do; at least a lot of us do. I may be a troglodyte but that’s not why. Well, I’m ok with where the thread has gone, but what I meant when I wrote the OP was what Thudlow Boink calls “hot dog sauce” in post #18. I’ve eaten Stagg and some other brand that came in a jar. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/53 "2009-02-27T03:04:01Z")
Ah. No, I don’t eat that stuff. I am annoyed when they give it to me in a fast food restaurant when I was expecting beans. ---
**Author:** ![Mudshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f04885/32.png) [@Mudshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mudshark)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 10:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/54 "2009-02-27T10:29:29Z")
A coworker uses canned beanless chili when she makes chili casserole. (Basically chili with tatertots on top). ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/55 "2009-02-27T10:37:55Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > You keep a week’s worth of microwave popcorn in your house? BJs sells it by the case, 24 pouches of it or thereabouts. It sells quite well around here, people buy it and take it in to work instead of paying vending machine prices. Works out to something like fifteen cents a pouch or so. ---
**Author:** ![johnspartan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a183cd/32.png) [@johnspartan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnspartan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/56 "2009-02-27T14:35:26Z")
For those who like the convenience of out of can, esp. for office lunch… now that you can get pretty good sliced & individually wrapped pepperjack cheese, I suggest takin’ a couple of slices of that with you, mixing it in with the chili when you nuke it. Gives it a bit of a nudge you wouldn’t get from cheddar, without being “stupid-hot.” ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/57 "2009-02-27T16:55:05Z")
I can honestly say that I have never eaten proper “chili with beans” out of a can, knowingly. I’m sure I have had it in instutional settings somewhere down the line. And even for coney dogs we always used the specific chili meat sauce in the small cans made especially for coney dogs, coney sauce doesn’t/shouldn’t have beans in it as far as I’m concerned. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/58 "2009-02-27T17:17:27Z")
[This](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_5HAG1QMLIrc/RqTUbrTZdPI/AAAAAAAAAtA/jn_pC3kcB2Y/s320/chili.jpg) is what I ate most growing up. Now it’s mostly [this.](http://www.hormelsoccer.com/downloadflder72/HormelChili72.jpg) Both have hot dogs on the label, but they both say “chili”, not “hot dog sauce”. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2009, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/59 "2009-02-27T17:28:05Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Hot dog chili is something different from eatin’ chili (e.g. [this](http://faribaultfoods.elsstore.com/view/product/?id=49308&cid=952) as opposed to [this](http://faribaultfoods.elsstore.com/view/product/?id=16596&cid=952))—it doesn’t have beans or anything else chunky, often comes in a smaller can, and is labeled something like “Coney Sauce” or “Chili Sauce.” And I agree. [Chili sauce](http://product.expotv.com/1/1/6/116177_150x150.jpg) goes on hot dogs; [chli](http://www.globalpackagegallery.com/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=46861&g2_serialNumber=2) doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![AveDementia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bc8723/32.png) [@AveDementia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AveDementia)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2009, 7:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543/60 "2009-02-28T07:46:24Z")
One can of chili with no beans. One package of cream cheese. One bag of Frito scoops. Put chili in bowl, put cream cheese on top (in pieces, preferably, for better melting), put bowl in microwave. Heat and stir. Use scoops for dipping. I actually split it between two bowls before heating, for my bf and I. It’s much better with cream cheese than cheddar, in my opinion. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chili-in-a-can-have-you-ever-used-it-for-anything-but-hot-dogs/487543.md?page=4)