Guacamole and Chili con Carne: a match made in Mexican Heaven!Last Monday, we had a guest (Nancy) for dinner. I decided to take everybody south, with litres of lemonade and a bag full of spices thrown across our chest for survival. En route for Mexico!
Let me take you on the trail of our short culinary itinerary of the night: First, I suggested we paid a tribute to the great Aztecs' tradition, so we started with an individual side dip of Guacamole-Olé!
Let me take you on the trail of our short culinary itinerary of the night: First, I suggested we paid a tribute to the great Aztecs' tradition, so we started with an individual side dip of Guacamole-Olé!I made it super plain: 2 avocados, crushed, mixed with the juice of 1/2 a lemon, paprika and all spices, with a bit of fennel seeds for decoration. FYI, I didn't add any jalapenos or tomatoes as the chili was already rich in those ingredients...
Then, I invited them to join me in the Hacienda of Chili con Carne, Arri-Arriba!
Hacienda de San Antonio (dating back to 1879), now a hotel in Mexico.
Lhasa de Sela
In a nutshell, it was a memorable Chili (not chilly, oh no!) night. I say memorable, and not the ultimate chili ever; because, you know, with chilis, proportions and ingredients tend to vary according to taste, inspiration, and what is left on your spice rack...So there are many other variations of that good chili night! Making a chili is indeed very creative. It is enjoyable to play with this traditional, homely Tex-Mex specialty. Preparing a chili in a big pot feels, to me, a bit like a ritual. It is chemistry. Like a magical potion: "Fair is foul, and foul is fair", could I sing in unison with Macbeth's Weird Sisters...
But enough with my talking about chili, here is time to make it happen!
Ingredients:
Serves 6-8 people
600-800g medium ground beef (organic, if possible)
1 or 2 large chopped onions
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp dried ground cumin or to taste
2 tbsps dried chili powder, or to taste
1 tbsp of ground coriander, or to taste
1 or 2 fresh chili peppers or jalapeno peppers
A few marinated chilis (4-5) are great for extra spicy flavours too!
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
700-800 g of tomato puree, diced tomato sauce, or fresh tomatoes, coarsely chopped (or a combination of all three)
400-600 g of Romano or Red Kidney beans
200 g of Black beans
NB: If you go for dried beans instead of their canned cousins, don't forget to damp them for a night and boil them with a tsp of baking soda to help with the digestion process...
2-3 squares of dark chocolate (70% cocoa)
Fresh leaves of coriander for garnish
.In a large soup pot over medium-high heat, fry ground beef, onion, and garlic until the meat becomes grey in colour. Add cumin, chili powder, jalapenos, salt, pepper, tomatoes. Reduce heat to low and simmer, covered, approximately 1-2 hours, stirring often. Note: additional beef broth, water, or wine may be added as needed.
.Add beans and continue to simmer another 30 minutes. Remove the lid from your pot to make sure the mixture is not too drowned into juice.
Note: During the last 30 minutes of cooking, do a lot of tasting and adjust seasoning to taste.
.Toss 2-3 squares or a grating of bitter (70% cocoa) chocolate into chili to cut down the acidity of the tomatoes. It will help give body to the chili and mellow the flavors.
.Serve in large individual bowls.
NB: Chili is like any other stews, the more you heat it up, the better it gets! For maximum flavour, cool chili and refrigerate overnight so that flavours will mellow. Reheat chili over low heat.
Red Chili Peppers , watercolour by Ileana Carrena
Then, I invited them to join me in the Hacienda of Chili con Carne, Arri-Arriba!
Hacienda de San Antonio (dating back to 1879), now a hotel in Mexico.The chili , which arguably is not the most typical Mexican food (it can be found worldwide, and is the official dish of Texas, USA!), did wonders that night! I served it as our main course; with blue corn chips and a side salad of arugula. But this was not my first try with chili...
I love chilis! I must have made about a dozen of them since the last year and a half, when I first moved in with my Peruvian-born husband, Marco. He loves spicy cuisine, and so do I, even if my tolerance is not as high as his... Chili Con Carne is one of our favourite dishes, when it comes down to cooking together (another big hit with us being the boeuf en daube!), as it really is a lot of fun to prepare. Marco could not participate in the preparartion of this chili, so I had to play it solo, and decide on the spiciness alone. I enjoyed the experimentation and took down a few notes.
This being said, I am therefore happy to declare that this chili con carne worked out beautifully: spicy, subtle, bitter-sweet, filling but not like a brick of beans dropping down into your stomach. And the final spicy touch was brought by Marco, who chose to play Lhasa's legendary La Llorona while we were having dinner.
Lhasa de SelaBut enough with my talking about chili, here is time to make it happen!
Ingredients:
Serves 6-8 people
600-800g medium ground beef (organic, if possible)
1 or 2 large chopped onions
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp dried ground cumin or to taste
2 tbsps dried chili powder, or to taste
1 tbsp of ground coriander, or to taste
1 or 2 fresh chili peppers or jalapeno peppers
A few marinated chilis (4-5) are great for extra spicy flavours too!
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
700-800 g of tomato puree, diced tomato sauce, or fresh tomatoes, coarsely chopped (or a combination of all three)
400-600 g of Romano or Red Kidney beans
200 g of Black beans
NB: If you go for dried beans instead of their canned cousins, don't forget to damp them for a night and boil them with a tsp of baking soda to help with the digestion process...
2-3 squares of dark chocolate (70% cocoa)
Fresh leaves of coriander for garnish
.In a large soup pot over medium-high heat, fry ground beef, onion, and garlic until the meat becomes grey in colour. Add cumin, chili powder, jalapenos, salt, pepper, tomatoes. Reduce heat to low and simmer, covered, approximately 1-2 hours, stirring often. Note: additional beef broth, water, or wine may be added as needed.
.Add beans and continue to simmer another 30 minutes. Remove the lid from your pot to make sure the mixture is not too drowned into juice.
Note: During the last 30 minutes of cooking, do a lot of tasting and adjust seasoning to taste.
.Toss 2-3 squares or a grating of bitter (70% cocoa) chocolate into chili to cut down the acidity of the tomatoes. It will help give body to the chili and mellow the flavors.
.Serve in large individual bowls.
NB: Chili is like any other stews, the more you heat it up, the better it gets! For maximum flavour, cool chili and refrigerate overnight so that flavours will mellow. Reheat chili over low heat.
Red Chili Peppers , watercolour by Ileana Carrena
Buen provecho!
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