Winter comfort.
Easy to pressure can or freeze.
Simple to prepare.
Everyone in the family eats it.
These are the reasons we eat Small Bean Chili so often in our house. It’s one of the recipes that I make a BIG batch of each fall to get us through winter. We just ate our last jar a few weeks ago so I made another big batch and served that at one of our monthly family dinners (more on that later) so it’s gone again. On a chilly Spring day I’ll probably throw together another batch and fill a bunch of jars to freeze.
So, here’s an admission. We use Ragu sauce. Yes, I know. I said it. It’s one of the things my family is holding out on. I do make my own spaghetti sauce but their taste buds have been trained to accept commercially-made sauce more easily. Homemade sauce tends to have a tang that they don’t much like. But, I keep trying. I will win them over at some point because, well, nasty ingredients.
Here’s something else. We don’t like big beans. Ewwww, kidney beans and cannellini beans. We like small beans like adzuki, black eyed peas, pinto beans and black beans. I’ll even go as far as garbanzos but they’re a different shape so I like to keep them all similar in this chili. Using small beans really reduces the mush factor. If you can’t sell your littles on chili with big beans, give the smaller beans a try. Adzuki beans are particularly small and don’t feel like beans much at all.
The recipe is so simple I’m not even going to do a recipe card for it. Feel free to double, triple or quadruple it. You can also tweak it with some other spices like cilantro and cumin.
We go for the simple things at our house.
Ingredients:
Heat a little bit of oil in a large stock pot.
Sauté some chopped onions and garlic until transluscent.
Brown 1 lb. of ground beef (ground turkey will work too but the flavor will be lighter)
Add four cans of beans that have been drained and rinsed.
Add 1 large jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce (homemade or organic is preferred)
Add 1/4 cup of maple syrup and 1 tsp. each of chili powder, paprika, garlic powder and onion powder.
Add 1 Tbls. each of fresh oregano, basil, parsley and thyme. (use 1 tsp. if using dried)
Allow this to simmer for about an hour, check taste and adjust as desired.
Serve with fresh parmesan cheese and garlic bread.
It’s that simple.