Well….at the age of 48 as I write this….I’ve just cooked my first chilli con carne from scratch!! I love this dish! Had it so many times over the years but I’ve always stayed away from making it myself. To help me relax I decided to bite the bullet and have a go myself. I found this simple recipe from the LEGENDS that are the Hairy Bikers via the BBC food channel. It went down a storm, I’ll be making it again for sure in large batches as this is my perfect comfort food, either with rice, on jacket potatoes, in nachos or on chips with cheese added. Beautiful !!

Ingredients- 500g of lean mince beef, 2 onions finely diced, 3 garlic cloves sliced, 1 or 2 tsp of chilli powder, 2 tsp of cumin powder, 2 tsp of coriander powder, 2 tbsp of plain flour, 150ml of red wine (it’s compulsory to finish the bottle then!) 300ml of beef stock, 1 tin of chopped tomatoes, 1 tin of red kidney beans rinsed under cold water, 3 tbsp of tomato purée, 1 tsp of caster sugar, 1 tsp of dried oregano, 1 bay leaf, a good pinch of sea salt and a good pinch of black pepper.

Method –

Heat a non stick large pan. Add in your diced onions and beef mince. Break the beef mince down by pushing it into the sides of the pan. Brown off the mince which should take about 5 minutes.

Once you’ve browned off your mince then the party starts !!!! The rest of the dish builds very quickly!!

Add in your diced garlic….

Quickly followed by your dried spices – ground coriander, ground paprika, chilli powder.

Fry off the spices for 2 minutes giving the pan a good stir to combine it all.

Add in the plain flour, again giving it a good stir to combine everything, this obviously is your thickening agent.

Add the red wine….giving it a good stir…

Followed by the beef stock.

Mix and combine stirring well. This should already start to thicken a little as the dish comes together.

Add in the dried oregano, tomato purée, bay leaf, sugar, salt and pepper, again giving the pan a good stir to combine the flavours.

Add in your rinsed kidney beans….

Followed by the chopped tomatoes…..

Give the pan a big stir. Bring to a simmer, reduce the heat and let it gently bubble away for 45 minutes. Remember to give it the occasional stir to prevent it sticking. The dish will come together with little effort after this point. I put some rice on how I would normally cook it – 1/2 cup of basmati rice to 1 cup of cold water. Bring to the boil, reduce the water under the level of the rice, remove it from the heat keeping the lid on to steam itself for 20 minutes or so.

Finished dish.. chilli con carne with fluffy basmati rice served on these beautiful Denby plates which were a find in a local charity shop…bonus. Perfect comfort food !!

Thank you for reading my ramblings if you have. I loved making this dish. Thank you Hairy Bikers for inspiring me ❤️