Every year when the weather begins to turns cold my thoughts turn to big steaming pots of chili. I have found few more wonderful smells then the aroma of a big pot of chili bubbling away on the stove top. So this week I thought I would share a basic chili recipe so that everyone could get some stick to your ribs goodness in this cold, wet weather. Since I have personally witnessed several chili bean/no bean debates that turned violent I have included a little disclaimer.
Traditional Red Chili is defined by the International Chili Society as any kind of meat or combination of meats, cooked with red chili peppers, various spices and other ingredients, with the exception of BEANS and PASTA which are strictly forbidden.
I don’t know who died and made them chili gods, but if you want to use beans go ahead, I used beans in this recipe as a way of increasing volume without much extra cost.
Pork Chop Chili:
For ingredients I went with only what I already had in the house. For the protein I chose pork, I had found a family pack of pork loin chops for six bucks and thrown it in the freezer. I used 5 pork chops in the recipe, the other two we ate the next night. The spices I always have on hand, as well as garlic, onion, beans and tomatoes.
Ingredients:
2 lbs pork (any cut)
2 large tomatoes
2 large onions, yellow
4 cloves garlic
2 cups stock
4 cups water
1 cup flour
4 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 cup chili powder
1 Tbsp cumin
Salt and pepper to taste
Trim meat of any excess fat and slice into 1inch cubes.
Heat oil in large stock pot.
Lightly dust the pork in flour and place in oil, brown lightly on all sides and remove.
Chop your onions, tomatoes, and garlic. You want big chunky pieces.
Sweat half the onion and garlic in the pot for 2-3 minutes then deglaze with white wine.
Add back in your meat, along with the stock, water, and Spices.Bring to a boil.
Reduce heat and simmer 3 hours or until meat is tender. The Chili should thicken as it reduces.
In the last 30 minutes add any additional ingredients you would like as well as the remaining beans, tomatoes, onion, and garlic.
If it is still to thin you can thicken it with a little corn starch. Simply mix cornstarch in cool water till it is like wet sand and stir in slowly while the chili boils.
Chili is a great opportunity to be creative. Once you have the basic chili cooking you can add anything to make it your own. If you want spicy add a little cayenne pepper, veggies instead of meat for a vegetarian twist, or maybe serve it on hot dogs.
However you like it, the key is enjoy it with people you love and it will always taste great.
As always,
Stay hungry my friends
Martin
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