Discovering Locality While Wandering on a Road Trip

When I go on a long road trip I like to notice what’s along the way – the shape of the land, the color of the soil, how the land is used, what crops are growing, and whatever else may be out there to discover. Noticing just becomes what you do when you adopt the mindset of wandering.

As you pass through communities you may also notice that there is oftentimes a sense of sameness. The same Walmarts, cineplexes, parking lots, whatever. But if you takes a second look, you might notice something that sets that community apart from everyone else.

If you happen to visit Abraham Lincoln’s hometown (Springfield, Illinois) for the Lincoln sites,

you might pass this sign for Dew Chilli Parlor.

And notice that the parlor spells chili with two L’s rather than one L.

Springfield, Illinois has long considered itself one of the great Chilli centers of the universe, and Dew’s may be responsible for the two L’s in the spelling of chilli in Springfield. When Dew’s opened in 1909, chili parlors were more common than they are today. Dew’s finally shut down in the 1990s. Fortunately for us, the Dew name and recipe were resurrected in 2013.

If you happen to go into a grocery store near Springfield, you’ll also run into two L’s on the cans of Ray’s Chilli and Chilli Man Chili.

The roots of both Ray’s and Chilli Man go back to around 1920 when Springfield resident, Porte DeFrates, brought back a chili recipe he discovered in Texas. Porte subsequently started cooking and selling the chilli in Springfield. When Porte returned to Texas, his brother Ray took over the operation and renamed it after himself. Porte’s son Joe, while working for his Uncle Ray, decided to come up with his own chilli recipe and subsequently started Chilli Man Chili. Joe DeFrates went on to win several chili cookoff championships.

Both Ray’s and Chilli Man were canned in the Springfield area until each of them sold out to larger food processing companies. Even though the brands are now produced and canned elsewhere, they are both still available in Springfield and in many other grocery stores in the Midwest.

In addition to Springfield, many other areas are known for their chili, most notably, Cincinnati and Texas. Cincinnati chili is very distinctive and, in my opinion, very good. It has a hint of cinnamon and unsweetened chocolate in its recipe. Cincinnati chili is usually serve on spaghetti with chopped onions and shredded cheese (known in Cincinnati as 4-way).

Texas chili, again in my opinion, is also very good and very similar to Springfield chilli. While traveling through Springfield, I picked up a can of both Ray’s and Chilli Man chili. I even picked up a can of Skyline chili that I saw on the grocer’s shelf. (Skyline is a leading chain of Cincinnati style chili parlors.) When I got home to Albuquerque, I picked up a can of nationally available Hormel Chili and regionally available Wolf Brand Chili (a leading brand of Texas style chili). With five cans of chili, I decided have my own chili cookoff and do a comparison test.

As expected, the Cincinnati style chili was completely different (and again quite good). The remaining four cans of chili were different from each other but not that much different from each other for me to make a distinction on which one was better or what was different about them. The Hormel Chili may have been a bit milder and geared to the taste buds of kids. But after living in New Mexico for 23 years, where I am used to spicy foods, all four cans of chili, although quite good in my opinion, could have turned the heat up.

 

With our Springfield double L chilli curiosity satisfied, we’ll shift gears and drive 90 miles south of Springfield to Collinsville, Illinois in the greater St. Louis area. Collinsville is the home of Cahokia Mounds. Cahokia is an amazing collection of pre-historic Native American earthworks and a designated World Heritage Site. In its heyday (800 to 1000 years ago), it may have had more people living there than London would have had at that time.

If you drive to the south side of Collinsville, you have the opportunity to see the world’s largest catsup bottle.

The bottle began its life as the water tower for the Brooks Catsup factory. At one time Brooks Catsup was widely distributed and billed itself as a tangy catsup. Like Ray’s and Chilli Man, Brooks was acquired by a larger food processing company and production was moved to a different location.

Brooks Ketchup is now made in Canada and has very limited distribution. Fortunately, I was able to buy a bottle of Brooks while in the Collinsville area.

As you can see from the pictures above, Brooks no longer has a fluted bottle and has adopted the more conventional spelling of ketchup rather than catsup.

Again, when I got home, I did a comparison between Brooks and Heinz Ketchup. Both tasted like ketchup to me and both would be quite suitable for use. As for “tangy,” my taste buds have been conditioned to spicy foods so I did not notice anything particularly “hot” about Brooks ketchup. So from this perspective Brooks turned out to be just ketchup.

 

If we shift gears again and drive west from the world’s largest catsup bottle back towards the Cahokia mounds we’ll soon enter an area called the American Bottoms. It is the area between the bluffs near Collinsville and the Mississippi River to the west. With the Bottoms being a Mississippi River flood plain, its accumulation of silt and nutrients has made the soil very fertile. It was the fertility of the soil that made Cahokia a success and also has made the Collinsville area the country’s leading center for growing horseradish.

Horseradish farming came to the area when German settlers in the 19^th-century started growing horseradish in garden plots for their own consumption. With the soil proving to be exceptional for growing horseradish, acreage increased. With increased acreage, the warehousing, sales, distribution infrastructure and overall knowledge to support horseradish farming soon followed.

With the infrastructure in place and not many acres required to supply the world’s appetite for a boutique crop like horseradish, Collinsville with, what is believed to be, 60-percent of the world’s production is the horseradish capital of the world. Not too many places can claim the title of Horseradish Capital of the World along with having a designated World Heritage Site and the World’s Largest Bottle of Catsup!

 

So remember when you next go out on a road trip, there will always be something out there for you to discover!