Monday 29 November 2010

Chilli Con Carne

So the mystery of the secret weekend cooking can be revealed!

It was mum's birthday at the weekend, and a lot of family and friends were down from Scotland - as well as a few others from England - so I cooked a big pot of chilli to sit with all the rest of the food that my sister and her friend had put together.

As a side note, the promised tangerine sorbet has not come to fruition as I've been sick since Saturday and so haven't gotten around to it. My bad.

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I forgot my camera when I went to mum's, so I just have one picture that I took with my phone. It's not especially brilliant, but who doesn't know what chilli looks like?

You will need (cooking for about 20):

- 4tbsp oil
- 4 onions
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 2kg beef mince
- 500ml red wine
- 800g canned, peeled tomatoes
- 800g red kidney beans
- 8tbsp tomato puree
- 8tsp dried ground chilli
- 2tsp ground cumin
- 2tsp ground coriander
- 2 beef stock cubes

This is a fantastic recipe in that it can all be put together in one pot. For this many people, the cooking takes around 2 hours or so.

Start by dicing the onions up very small. Crush the garlic cloves and then fry them off with the onions in the oil. Once they start to brown, add in all the mince and brown it too.

The mince takes a fair wee while to brown all the way through. Just keep turning it over in the pan until it all takes on colour.

Now for the wine - pour it all in and then cover the pan for a few minutes until the whole lot starts to boil. Let the alcohol cook off for about five minutes.

Next up is all the seasoning. Add in the tomatoes from the cans (make sure to chop them well first if they aren't pre-chopped), the tomato puree, the chilli, cumin, coriander, and crumble in the stock cubes. Give the whole lot a good stir before covering once again.

Turn the heat down a bit and leave the pan to simmer for about an hour.

Once the hour is up, uncover, add in the kidney beans and cook for a further twenty minutes.

Once this time is up, you're ready to serve - best with rice and pitta breads.

Enjoy!

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Coming up:

- Who knows?

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