Seriously - throw away every other recipe you have because this really is the world's best chili recipe. Naturally gluten-free and ready in just 30 minutes, this soul-warming chili is perfect for whipping up after a busy day when you want a bowl of something comforting to cuddle up with. I love serving mine with a perfect baked potato, but you can nuzzle it onto a bed of rice, spaghetti or french fries - whatever tickles your fancy!
Until I started making my own at home, I thought I hated chili. Looking back now, that's probably because the only chili I'd ever had was made by My Official Treat Taster who was essentially adding some ground beef and chopped onions to a jar of pre-made chilli sauce and heating it up. And let me tell you, the world's greatest chili recipe that certainly isn't. My main gripe with chili was that it wasn't tomato-ey enough. The stuff out of the tin had little to no tomatoes or tomato sauce in it, which left the resulting chili dry and pretty much flavourless. And who would want that?
Then when I started getting into cooking (hey, I wasn't always a food blogger!) I learned that I could take foods I thought I hated and make them more palatable to my personal taste by changing up the ingredients. In this case, adding boat loads of tomatoes and tomato sauce to a classic chili recipe. The result was amazing - so amazing in fact that since I first made it years ago, this is the only chili recipe I've ever made since. When you've stumbled upon perfection, why carry on looking, you know?
So if you're searching for the best ever chili recipe with ground beef, you've come to the right place! I've also made this recipe with ground pork before and think that works wonderfully, too. There are plenty of recipes on Pinterest for chili made with ground chicken or ground turkey, but I've never made my recipe with either of those. Beef and pork are higher in fat that chicken and turkey and I personally think that's something you need for an award winning chili recipe*.
Okay, so my chili recipe might not have won any awards, but I'm pretty sure that's because I've never entered it into any competitions. I'm sure if I did that it would win first place hands down. After all, who could say no to a giant bowl of tomato-ey, spicy comfort food topped with melted cheddar cheese? I know I cant!
Ingredients
- 2 teaspoons olive oil
- 1 onion diced
- ¼ green bell pepper diced
- ¼ red bell pepper diced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- ¼ cup sweetcorn
- 250 g /0.5lb raw ground beef
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon oregano
- 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 400 g /0.8lb tinned chopped tomatoes
- 250 g /0.5lb tomato sauce
- ¼ cup cooked and drained kidney beans
- optional: grated cheese for topping
Instructions
- Drizzle the olive oil into a large frying pan over a medium-high heat.
- Add in the diced onion and peppers and cook for 5 minutes, until the veggies soften.
- Stir in the minced garlic and sweetcorn and cook for 2 minutes, until fragrant.
- Add in the ground beef and cook for an extra 5 minutes, until all the meat has been browned.
- Drain off the excess fat and sprinkle in the chili powder, cumin, oregano, cayenne pepper, paprika and salt.
- Stir in the chopped tomatoes, tomato sauce and kidney beans. Make sure everything is well combined and all the spices are evenly distributed.
- Lower the heat to medium-low and leave the chili to simmer for 10 minutes, until the sauce is thick.
- Serve immediately topped with grated cheese whilst hot with your favourite comfort food side dish.
Here are the link parties I link up to. Come and party with me!
KRISSY @ Pretty Wee Things
Yum! I love chilli, especially the ones made from scratch without packet flavours. I am definitely going to give this one a try later in the week. I think your recipe totally should have won a few awards too! xx