Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Habañero Death Chili

Okay, so here's one of those recipes I promised. This is my own. I looked up a bunch of chili recipes and decided to make my own out of stuff I like in some recipes with none of what I don't. It's my recipe, I can do what I want! And what do I like? I like spicy. The spicy you can only get with habañeros. What do I don't want? Tomatoes. Tomatoey chilis are good, but I'd rather just have the beans, meat, and peppers. One recipe I found had three different meats, so I started there. Here's my recipe:

Habañero Death Chili:

1/2 lb bacon
1 lb ground beef
1 lb ground pork
1 green bell pepper
1 yellow onion
6 jalapeño peppers
6 habañero peppers
6 anaheim peppers
2 cloves garlic
1 1/2 Tbsp ground cumin
1 Tbsp crushed red pepper flakes
3 Tbsp chili powder
2 Tbsp beef bouillon
2 (16oz) cans kidney beans
2 (16oz) cans black beans
2 (16oz) cans pinto beans
1 (12oz) bottle beer
2 cups water

Finely chop onion and peppers (the hotter the pepper, the finer it should be chopped). Fry the bacon until it is crispy; blot the grease and chop fine. Cook the ground beef and pork until half done. Drain grease, add chopped bacon and vegetables, continue cooking until meat is done. Place meat and vegetables in cooking pot. Drain and rinse beans, add to pot with water and spices. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and let simmer 20 minutes. Add beer, simmer additional 20-30 minutes.

If you have reservations about cooking with alcohol, use a cup of water or broth instead of the beer, or add it earlier to let more of the alcohol cook off. It is a popular ingredient common to many chili recipes. I've made a couple of these, and let the alcohol cook off (most, not all, cooks off, but the remaining amount is not significant), and it adds a good subtle flavor to the chili. At the recommendation of a friend, I used Fat Tire, but almost any non-lite beer will have enough flavor to work well.

If you prefer less heat, use fewer habañeros. Nearly all the heat in this recipe comes from those. The other peppers don't add a noticeable amount of heat, only flavor. Cheese and sour cream also serve to balance the heat a bit.

Orphan meat may be used as a substitute for ground pork, as it has a similar but richer, juicier flavor. It is hard to come by, though, and illegal in some states.

It goes really well with macaroni & cheese!


Or, better yet, a macaroni chili dog. Yes. I made one. Here it is. It was the best thing ever.


Feel free to play around with it and offer suggestions. If you make it, please give me feedback!

2 comments:

Cassie said...

You came up with a name for it!

Rebekah Wood said...

I LOVE good chili (though yeah, I'll omit the cerveza) and gee, I love mac-n-cheese too. :)