FOR some, if there’s no chili, it’s not the Super Bowl. The just-out “Ultimate Chili Book” by Christopher B. O’Hara (Lyons Press) rounds up 30 traditional and creative recipes for the spicy classic, as well as legends, facts and ingredients info.

O’Hara takes “a bowl of red” on a journey, starting with a jerky version recalling pemmican – a dried meat of the Native Americans he calls the first “chiliheads” – and moving on to the anti-red, or white chili.