Our family Chilli Con Carne

This is one of our son’s favourite dishes. There are so many recipes for Chilli Con Carne – this is one that I have used for decades, in fact since we used to cook the dish in my lunchtime restaurant in Parnell way back in the early 1980’s!!

 You can’t go wrong with this recipe and the only variable is how hot you want it to be. The key ingredient here is the cayenne pepper, so if you want the Chilli to be a bit milder, simply halve the amount of cayenne pepper, too easy! This dish freezes well too

 Serve with rice and, if you have the time, a simple side dish of corn, capsicum and onion with just a hint of Mexican seasoning. Corn chips, salsa, sour cream and guacamole all go well with Chilli

Ingredients

1 kg beef mince

2 cans red kidney beans

2 cans tomato puree

2 onions, chopped reasonably fine

2 teaspoons chilli powder

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 tablespoons Worcester sauce

Soy/salt to taste

Mexican seasoning – 1 teaspoon of whatever you like/have in your pantry, eg nachos, tacos mix (you can buy small packets in your supermarket)

250 gms rice or two packets of “boil in a bag”!

Oil

1 tablespoon tomato paste (optional)

Corn/ capsicum/ onion/ salsa mix to accompany

 Cooking instructions

1. In a large frypan, cook the mince in two batches, browning it – remove and set aside
2. Gently cook the onions until soft and starting to brown and then add back the meat, mixing thoroughly and breaking up the mince
3. Add the tomato puree, again mixing thoroughly
4. Add all the other ingredients apart from the kidney beans and cook on medium heat for around 10 minutes and finally the kidney beans
5. Check the seasoning adding more of the spices and salt to taste and cook for another 5 minutes
6. While the dish is cooking, make the rice as you would normally do
7. Taste and check seasoning - add more soy or salt as required

 Serve with rice and if you like, corn chips, sour cream, guacamole, whatever you like

 Corn/ capsicum/ onion/ salsa

Keep this really simple – gently fry 1 or 2 onions, add a teaspoon of Mexican seasoning and then some chopped capsicum, cooking on a med-high heat and finally half a packet of frozen corn. Check the seasoning and…. ya está…it’s ready or something like that in Spanish!

Serves 4 easily!