Recipe #64: chili! chilli! chile!

 Happy New Year! Let’s start 2026 on the right foot with a nice chili dinner!

Ingredients:


Directions:

Start with a couple of good glugs of neutral flavoured oil (I’m using canola oil) in a big pot and heat over medium high heat. Chop an onion and add it to the hot oil pot:


Sauté the chopped onion until softened:


Then add 3-ish finely chopped garlic cloves and sauté further for a few moments until fragrant and maybe not as browned as I’ve done:


Then add your lean ground beef, hopefully not still partially frozen like mine:


Is fine!

Brown the beef with the onions and garlic on medium heat until no longer pink:


Still pink! Keep going:


Perfect! 

Now start adding spices: a really generous amount of chili powder, about a tablespoon of ground cumin, and a few shakes of ground chipotle powder:


Golly it’s hard to see with all that steam!

Stir that all together on medium heat until the spice aroma fills your kitchen with fragrant spicy goodness, then add a can of tomatoes:


Pro tip: maybe chop or smash the whole tomatoes before adding them to the pot, otherwise if you lazily try chopping them in the pot you may end up with a mess:


Is fine!

I’m adding a whole dried ancho chili pepper, but you can omit this, or add whatever dried pepper you like, or tinned chipotle peppers in adobe sauce, or even fresh chopped peppers (which would be better added earlier with the onions but is fine!):


And simmer the whole mess on medium or slightly lower temperature, lid partially askew, stirring every now and then, for 30-90 minutes (or toss into a slow cooker at this point and go out for the day):


After simmering for a while, I like to thicken the chili a bit with a little corn masa flour (about a tablespoon), which I stir into water to make a slurry and add to the simmering chili as so:







Note I am using the empty tomato can as my mixing vessel, so as to not dirty another bowl unnecessarily and also get all the last tomato juice goodness. Thrifty!

The masa corn flour gently thickens the chili and adds a nice subtle corny flavour that I enjoy. 

When it’s about 30 minutes from serving time, drain a can of red kidney beans and add to the chili:


Stir everything and simmer gently for the last 30 minutes or so, stirring frequently to prevent sticking, adding more water if necessary to achieve ideal consistency:


Add salt and pepper to taste and serve however you like your chili: plain by itself, or with a carb (homemade wedge roast potatoes here, but I also love baked potatoes, smashed cheesy potatoes, fries, macaroni, tortillas, Frito chips, nacho chips, rice, crusty bread, rolls, pão de queijo, etc etc…) and topped with grated cheddar cheese and thick sour cream:


Happy New Year indeed!

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