Chili con Carne

A Mexican stew popular in the UK especially when used as a filling for jacket potatoes. This recipe is based on a few I found online, combined, and then heavily adjusted to my own taste and cooking style (call me ChefGPT). It's probably not "authentic" but I like it. This recipe produces around 6 to 8 portions depending on how generous you are when plating.

This recipe is quite spicy (at least for the UK palate) but probably not as spicy as it traditionally would be. Adjust the heat to your particular heat tolerance.

Ingredients

• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 2 Medium Onions
• 500g Minced Beef (As lean or fatty as you like, just remember that fat is flavour)
• 1 Red Pepper

• 3 Garlic Cloves
• 2tbsp Tomato Purée
• 1tbsp Hot Chilli Powder
• 1tbsp Paprika
• 2tsp Ground Cumin Seed
• 2tsp Ground Coriander Seed

• 2tbsp Plain Flour
• 150ml Red Wine
• 200ml Beef Stock (Use water and add 1 beef stock cube if you don't have fresh stock)
• 400g Can of Chopped Tomatoes (Or an equivalent quantity of fresh tomatoes optionally peeled and blanched)
• 410g Can of Red Kidney Beans

• 2tsp Chilli Flakes
• 1 Dried Habanero Chilli (Crushed)
• 3-4 Fresh Bird's Eye Chillies
• 1tsp Sugar
• 2tsp Dried Oregano
• 1tsp Dried Marjoram
• 2 Bay Leaves

• Salt
• Black Pepper

• ~5g Dark Chocolate (around 1 piece)

Preparation

1. Mise en Place

Dice the onion. A medium dice is sufficient unless you're terrified of finding a piece of cooked onion in your chili.

Dice the pepper into 1cm chunks.

Finely grate, crush, or mince the garlic. Combine in a small bowl with the tomato puree and the spices to form a spice paste. Add a splash of water if it's too thick to mix.

Dice the fresh chillies.

Combine the chillies, herbs, and sugar into a separate bowl.

Open all the tins. Drain and rinse the beans if you insist, but add extra stock or water to the recipe to compensate.

Measure out the necessary quantity of stock and wine into separate containers.

Weigh out the flour into a small bowl.

2. Pre-Cook the Onion

Fry the onion in some olive oil at a medium heat until soft and lightly browned then remove and set aside. Add splashes of water if it starts to burn before reaching your desired level of softness/brownness.

3. Fry

Fry the beef on medium-high heat in a little bit of olive oil. Make sure to break it up as it cooks to avoid clumps. When it starts to brown, add the diced pepper. Once the beef is browned and the pepper is softened, reintroduce the onion and lower the heat to medium-low.

While continuously stirring: add the spice paste, wait 1 minute, then add the flour, and wait a final 30 seconds.

4. Simmer

Slowly add the wine while stirring to avoid clumps. Then add the stock. Add the tomatoes, kidney beans, chillies, sugar, and herbs. Finally, season with salt and pepper.

Simmer loosely covered for 35-45 minutes stirring occasionally until the beef is tender and the stew is thick. You can simmer for much longer if you want to further develop the flavour but in those cases add the herbs (but not the chillies) close to the end.

5. Finishing Touches

Remove from the heat, stir in the chocolate and allow to sit for 10 minutes. At this point add more salt and pepper if needed. The stew should be saltier than you would normally want as it's designed to be paired with under-salted carbohydrates. Treat it more like a sauce.

The stew should be thick but feel free to loosen it up with water. Use hot water to maintain the stew at a serving temperature.

6. Serve

Use the stew to fill a jacket potato or on its own as a dip for tortilla chips. A load of grated cheddar cheese and a dollop of crème fraîche or sour cream are a common topping in both cases.