Kim's Awesome Chili

Almost every Saturday I go to Loleta Meat Market and pick up some hamburger from Pixie. She sells the good stuff.  Local grass fed, freshly ground hamburger.  You can see the difference, smell it, and definitely taste it.  Not just the flavor, but the texture is so much better then anything you can buy in a regular old grocery store.  She also has an amazing inventory of her own fresh made sausages, as well as pork, chicken, lamb, duck, and a great selection of offal.  Pixie rocks and I'm all about supporting her business. 

So, last night I had a pound of local burger from Pixie in my fridge that I needed to put to use, so I decided on chili.  I'm pretty broke, but always have a good supply spices on hand and just started pulling everything out that popped into my head that may be good in chili.  I didn't measure anything, I eyeballed it all and it came out perfect.  So I'm going to share what I made here, and give you my approximate measurements and, if you decide to recreate this recipe, I encourage you to adjust and change the ingredients to your taste.

I browned 1 lb of hamburger then added about 1/4 cup celery, 1/4 cup onion, 1/2 cup bell pepper, 1 tsp crushed garlic clove, and 1/2 tsp crushed coriander seeds.  Once the celery, onions and bell pepper were softened I added about 1/2 tbsp mendudo spice mix, 1 tsp paprika, 1/2 tsp chili powder, 1/4 tsp cumin 1/2 tsp unsweetened cocoa, 1 tsp sugar, 2 tsp kosher salt, 1 tsp chicken bullion, 1 can tomato sauce, 1 can pinto beans, drained, 1 diced tomato, 3 slices of cooked and crumbled bacon, 3/4 cup dark beer, 1 chipotle pepper, 1 diced pickled serrano pepper(my own homemade pickled serrano) and 1 tsp cinnamon.  I hope, and don't think I'm forgetting anything here. 

I let this simmer down until it got fairly thick.  I wanted it to be slightly soupy.  I had in the mean time cooked up some jasmine rice which I served my chili over.  I diced up some white onion to throw on top and grated some Loleta Smokey Cheddar Cheese on top.  It came out fantastic!  I think next time the only thing I'd do different is to add some Tobasco, or Tapatio to the chili while it's cooking and maybe double the chipotle.  I didn't this time around because I know the menudo spice can be pretty hot, but it mellowed out quite a bit and the chili wasn't as hot as I expected.  It had a nice warmth to it, that even my kids could have handled and enjoyed.  Rely quite nice, but I kind of like my chili to make me sweat a little, so next time I'll be kicking it up a notch.  Oh and maybe adding another 1/2 tsp of unsweetened cocoa. 

If you like chili, I hope you give this a try - It was a very fragrant and delicious dish.