Chilli Con Carne

Nothing warms the stomach quite like a bowl of hearty chilli con carne. Make it as firecracker hot as you can handle. The recipe below is a pretty tame version suitable for 3-year-old kids and nancy brother-in-law’s whose palates aren’t quite up to the heat. This recipes serves 4-6 hungry eaters.

Chilli Con Carne
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 medium onions, diced
1 small capsicum, red or green, diced
1 long red chilli, fresh, finely chopped (seeds optional)
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped/minced
2 teaspoons chilli powder
2 teaspoons ground cumin
Sea Salt to taste
Cracked Black Pepper to taste
500g Lean Beef Mince
1 stick cinnamon
1 x 140g tub tomato paste
2 x 400g tins chopped tomato
2 x 400g red kidney beans
Half a 400g tin of water

Choose a large heavy based pot suitable to sit and simmer on a stove for an hour or so.

Saute the diced onion, capsicum, fresh chilli, garlic, cumin and chilli powder in the olive oil until lightly coloured and fragrant.

Add the lean beef mince, breaking it up as it cooks. When browned, throw in the tomato paste and cook it out for 2-3 minutes. Add the cinnamon stick, tinned tomatoes, water and then season with sea salt and cracked black pepper.

Bring to the boil, give a good stir, reduce to a very low heat and cover with a cartouche (aka. wet scrunched up baking paper) . Set the timer for one (1) hour and then find something fun to do. This baby doesn’t require stirring.

When the timer wakes you from your reverie searching cookbooks for fantastic dessert recipes, open the tins of kidney beans and drain/rinse really well. Remove cartouche and add the beans, giving the whole mix a good stir. Replace cartouche and continue to cook on very low heat for 30 minutes.

Best served with rice, tasty cheese, jalapenos, sliced green onions, diced tomatoes and copious amounts of sour cream. But if you are trying to be somewhat healthy and the fridge ingredients are rather lean, then lettuce, tomato, light cheese and light sour cream might make a suitable alternative.