Chili

It’s not cold outside. It’s NOT cold outside. It’s NOT COLD OUTSIDE. It’s June, for goodness sake – and it’s cold outside. I could cry. Despite what it says on my calendar, we’ve had lots of wintery meals lately. We did sneak in a barbecue or two, but then the heavens opened and one day it was actually cold enough to put the heating back on. Awful

One of our cold weather staples is chilli con carne, which I do still make in warmer weather in the slow cooker. It’s one of those easy, forget about it, one pot meal kind of dish. Don’t let the long ingredient list scare you off; you can do a bit of prep work beforehand to save time when you start to put it all together. You can put all the spices together in a small bowl or ramekin and dice the vegetables ahead of time, for example.

This freezes really well and it’s great for buffet style meals – just leave it in a slow cooker on “low” and let guests serve themselves. You can also use this as a filling for enchiladas or burritos. People here tend to serve it on rice, but I always found that a bit too heavy. Why fill precious stomach space with rice when you can fill it with more chilli and things like cake?

My 7-year-old son loves this chilli wrapped up in a tortilla with shredded cheese, and globs of sour cream and guacamole. My 4-year-old daughter prefers it straight out of a bowl, and my 2-year-old daughter meticulously picks out all the beans. I kid you not, she will surgically remove any and all traces of beans from the chilli (but will quite happily devour a bowl of baked beans, go figure.)

I only season chilli just before serving, because I read somewhere that beans get very tough when cooked with salt. I dunno if this is true, but I’m not taking any chances. Remove the star anise and bay leaves before serving. Serve with whatever toppings you fancy.