3-Ingredient Chili Cheese Dip

September. Fall is arriving with the subtlety of a Southern grandmother — slow, warm, insistent, and carrying food. The heat is breaking. The light is shifting. Nashville in September is the exhale after the scream of summer — still hot, but gentler, the kind of hot that says "I'm leaving soon" instead of "I live here now." I welcome September the way you welcome a friend who always brings pie: with open arms and the knowledge that something sweet is coming.

Elijah has discovered his hands. He holds them in front of his face and stares at them with the intensity of a philosopher contemplating existence. HANDS. They MOVE. They're ATTACHED to ME. The revelation is ongoing. Every day: the hands. The looking. The slow, dawning understanding that those things at the end of his arms are his, and they do things, and one of the things they do is grab. He grabbed Chloe's hair this week. He grabbed Mama's earring. He grabbed my nose with the grip of a tiny dictator claiming territory. My nose is his now. I've accepted the terms.

The community screening — the fall one — happened virtually this week. VIRTUALLY. A screening on Zoom. I sat in my apartment and talked about dental health to a grid of faces on a screen and it was the most surreal professional experience of my life. You can't check teeth through a screen. You can't demonstrate flossing through a camera. You can show diagrams. You can answer questions. You can say "please see a dentist when it's safe" and watch people nod and know that "when it's safe" is a date that no one can name. Sixty-two people logged on. Down from ninety-three in person. The drop hurts. But sixty-two people chose to spend their Saturday morning learning about dental health on a computer screen during a pandemic, and that's sixty-two people who care enough to show up, even virtually. Showing up is showing up. The format doesn't change the fact.

Jayden has settled into remote kindergarten. Settled is generous — he tolerates it. He does the work. He talks to Diego on the screen (they've figured out the unmute button, which means the entire class is now subjected to their fire truck conversations). Mrs. Park sent me a note: "Jayden is enthusiastic and creative. We're working on his volume." His volume. The world has been working on Jayden's volume for five years. I wish Mrs. Park luck. She'll need it.

I made a big batch of chili. September chili. The annual transition meal — the meal that says summer is over and soup season has begun and the crockpot is back from its summer vacation. Chili with beans, ground beef, tomatoes, onions, peppers, and the spice blend I've been making since I was twenty-three and had nothing but a Waffle House paycheck and a crockpot and the belief that something in a pot could fix anything. The chili is still fixing things. The chili is still the answer. Different pot, different apartment, different number of kids at the table. Same chili. Same answer.

The big batch of chili I made this week reminded me that September is really just permission — permission to pull the crockpot out of the cabinet, turn something on low, and let the apartment smell like autumn for a few hours. When Jayden came home from his virtual kindergarten day and Elijah was finally napping and I just needed something I could make with my eyes half-closed, this 3-ingredient chili cheese dip was exactly right: the crockpot does the work, the chili does the comforting, and nobody in this apartment has to perform for it. Same spirit as the big pot, half the effort, and it disappears fast.

Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: 2 hours | Total Time: 2 hours 5 minutes | Servings: 10

Ingredients

1 can (15 oz) chili with beans
1 block (8 oz) cream cheese, softened and cut into cubes
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Instructions

Combine. Add the canned chili, cream cheese cubes, and shredded cheddar to a slow cooker. Stir gently to start combining.
Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, stirring every 30 minutes, until the cream cheese is fully melted and the dip is smooth and bubbling at the edges.
Stir and serve. Give the dip a final stir until everything is well combined. Keep on the WARM setting while serving. Serve with tortilla chips, crackers, or sliced bread for dipping.

Nutrition (per serving)

3-Ingredient Chili Cheese Dip — The Annual Transition Meal, Still the Answer