1 lb. ground beef
1 pkg spicy italian sausage
~ 3 tbsp chili powder
1 cup dry kidney beans
1 cup dry pinto beans
1 cup dry black beans
~4 cloves garlic
1 habanero pepper
1 yellow pepper
1 six back beer (medium-dark)
- De-sausage the sausage.
- Brown the ground beef and sausage in a cast-iron skillet.
- If you're health conscious, drain the excess fat. If you're not, don't.
- Chop the garlic. You can pretty much put in as little or as much garlic as you want
- The peppers need to be fire blackened. This can be a pain in the ass if you don't have a gas range, because lighters take forever. After they've been blackened,mince them. If you don't like your chili quite as spicy, remove the seeds.
- Add beer to a large crockpot. The whole six pack may or may not be too much. If it is, have a beer.
- Add all ingredients and set the crockpot for medium and cover.
So you pretty much want to do all this in the morning or the night before. If you start the night before, leave the crockpot on low. At the end of the day you can turn it up to finish the cooking if you need to. The secret to chilli is letting it slow cook all day.
A note on the beer: You can use water if you like, but I've found that beer adds all kinds of great flavor. I do NOT, however, recommend using Guiness. It was just too much, made the chili much too heavy.
I know, this sounds retardedly simplistic. Like I said, chili is easy. The adventure is in changing recipes around and trying different flavors. I like my chili spicy, which is where the habanero comes in (though it does add a great subtle flavor). In the past I've even tried using ground veal instead of beef, which I don't recommend. Veal simply doesn't have enough flavor to compliment all the other things going on.
A few people that have tried this recipe have suggested diced tomatoes, which I have yet to try. Tomatoes just seem like more of a stew type of thing.
-Caine
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