Middle One (our determined bean-hater) has gone off to Uni so this old favourite of mine is back on the cards at last.
It occured to me that as it's such a store cupboard winner, I must write it up - I am amazed to look back on my years of blogging and see that my once tiny people are now big people who have moved away from home and actually request me to blog their favourite meals so they can recreate them for themselves!
It pleases me that their friends also discover mey recipes through my kids, and also get an insight into my family's history!
Bean Chilli
Ingredients:
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- some garlic, chopped (to your taste)
- 1 tsp mixed herbs
- 1 tsp chilli powder or crushed chillies
- 1 tsp cumin powder
- 1 tin white beans
- 1 tin mixed beans (not in vinaigrette)
- 1 tin kidney beans in chilli sauce
- 1 tin chopped tomatoes.
- Marigold stock
- optional splash of wine (any wine is fine)
- 1 tsp cocoa or a small piece of 90 - 100 % cocoa chocolate
- splash of cider vinegar
- salt to taste
To serve:
- Boil in the bag or microwave long grain rice
- soured cream
- plain tortilla chips
- cheese for grating on top (we use medium and mature cheddar)
Fry the onion and garlic in a little oil and butter until soft and no longer smelling raw. Add the mixed herbs, cumin, and chilli.
Once those are well mixed in, add the tinned tomato and the kidney beans with their chilli sauce. Add a little water to the tins and swish to get as much of the "juice" from the tins and add to the pan.
Add the Marigold, and wine if using, as well as the cocoa/chocolate.
Mix well and simmer for a few minutes.
Meanwhile, drain and rinse the other 2 tins of beans, and then add to the pan when the sauce has thickened up a little.
Add salt to taste.
Allow this to simmer while you prepare the boil in the bag rice. As you know I LOVE good rice, but this is one meal I MUST have with boil in the bag rice. You don't have that preconception, so go ahead and save time with microwave rice, or just use whatever rice you have. Or skip the rice! It's all good.
Since there's nothing raw here, there's no real minumum time to cook this, so it's done when you are ready for it to be done.
When it's almost done, taste it, and add in more salt if you need to, as well as the splash of vinegar. Taste again and see how you feel about it. If you like it, great! If you don't then try and work out what's missing and add it. It's most likely that it needs either more salt, more acid, or more chilli. If it needs more umami, try adding a tsp of Marmite (other yeast extract spreads are available) or dashi stock powder. Tinkering with flavours is the best way to gain confidence with cooking.
Once the rice is done and you are happy with the flavour of the chilli, serve with a bag of plain tortilla chips, some grated cheese and some soured cream to dollop on (all optional, obviously - but you'll thank me if you do!)
All genuniely ready in under 30 minutes with mostly store cupboard things.
