Food & Drink

Red Chili with Three Variations

This chili pairs perfectly with James Beard award-winning author Crescent Dragonwagon’s cornbread. You can find three of her classic recipes on our blog.

From the author:

The vegetarian equivalent of basic traditional red chili, this is a dish I’ve been making ever since I outgrew the meat-centric version and began moving toward a plant-centered, eventually vegetarian, diet. Good Lord, that’s more than forty years now!

I make this and CD’s Chili Mole several times each winter. No two batches are quite the same, though the enthusiasm with which they’re greeted at the table is always high. And though this has way more vegetables and seasonings, and no meat at all, my sense of it, in a way maybe no one but I could understand, remains rooted in the previous recipe, given to me by my old friend Genie Reece. My idea of what the feel of chili is was formed by that one. If I’ve wandered far afield from it over the years, the pleasure and satisfaction derived from these two very different bowls of chili are identical.

CD’s Neo-Traditional RED CHILI

Serves 8 to 10 generously, with Fixins and cornbread

INGREDIENTS

1 pound dried pinto beans, picked over, rinsed, and soaked overnight or quick-soaked
About 3 quarts any well-flavored vegetable stock (or a 12-ounce bottle of beer plus enough water to make up the difference)
2 bay leaves
1 ancho chile, whole (see Note)
1 jalapeño pepper, stemmed, seeds removed for mildness or left in for heat, coarsely chopped
Freshly ground black pepper
Vegetable oil cooking spray
¼ cup olive oil
2 large onions, chopped
3 green bell peppers, stemmed, seeded, and chopped
1 tablespoon cumin seeds
2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground coriander
¼ teaspoon cayenne, or to taste
2 teaspoons sweet Hungarian paprika
½ teaspoon smoked sweet Hungarian paprika
1 tablespoon hot chili powder
½ teaspoon dried oregano
3 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
1 can (16 ounces) chopped tomatoes in juice (preferably fire-roasted)
¼ cup tomato paste
1 to 2 tablespoons Pickapeppa sauce or vegetarian Worcestershire sauce
1½ teaspoons tamari or shoyu soy sauce (wheat-free if desired)
Salt
1 to 3 teaspoons honey or Succanat
Truman Capote’s Family’s Cornbread, for serving
Chili Fixins, for serving

INSTRUCTIONS

Drain the soaked beans and rinse them well. Put them in a large, heavy soup pot, add enough stock to cover the beans to a depth of 1½ inches, and add the bay leaves, ancho chile, jalapeño pepper, and lots and lots of freshly ground black pepper (you can hardly add too much). Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer and cook, covered, over low heat until the beans are nearly tender, 1½ to 2 hours.
When the beans are tender-ish but still holding their shape, about 1¼ hours into their simmer, spray a large, heavy skillet with oil, add the olive oil, and place it over medium heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring, until they start to soften, 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in the bell peppers and cook for another 2 minutes. Then add all of the remaining spices and the oregano, lower the heat slightly, and cook, stirring constantly, for 1 to 2 minutes. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, until it just becomes fragrant, about 30 seconds. Remove the onion mixture from the heat.
Scrape the onion mixture into the simmering beans. Deglaze the pan with a little bean stock, stirring to loosen any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Return this liquid to the beans.
Stir the tomatoes, tomato paste, Pickapeppa, tamari, salt—it will take quite a bit—and honey into the beans. Continue to simmer, partially covered, until the seasonings are well blended and the beans are fully tender, 30 to 45 minutes.
Just before serving, pick out the bay leaves and the stem from the chile. Mash a couple of ladlefuls of the beans against the sides of the pot to thicken the chili slightly. While you can serve it hot, right away, it’s much better if brought to room temperature then covered and refrigerated overnight, and reheated the next day. Whenever you serve it, accompany it with cornbread and any or all of the Fixins, making dinner an interactive affair.

NOTE
Ancho chiles are dried poblanos. They are dark in color and triangular in shape, and can be found packaged in the Mexican foods aisle of most supermarkets or at any natural foods store where spices are sold in bulk.

VARIATIONS
Kachina’s Chili: Substitute black beans for the pintos.

Charlotte’s Chili: Charlotte, my mother, is ninety-five as of this writing. She amped up her mild ground-beef-and-bean chili when I got together with my Texan then-husband, Crispin. To Crispin’s amusement and wonder, however, she could not be broken of the habit of serving chili over cooked macaroni. So, to do chili Charlotte-style, serve this (or any other chili) over cooked elbow macaroni.

Chou-Chou’s Chili: My friend Chou-Chou puts cinnamon—⅛ to ¼ teaspoon per batch—in her chili. It gives the simmering pot an exotic, hard-to-place sweetness reminiscent of some Moroccan and Greek dishes. Very nice. Add the cinnamon when you add the other spices.

Bean by Bean
by Crescent Dragonwagon

From old friends like chickpeas and pintos to rediscovered heirloom beans like rattlesnake beans and teparies, from green beans and fresh shell beans to peanuts, lentils, and peas, Bean by Bean is the definitive cookbook on beans. It’s a 175-plus recipe cornucopia overflowing with information, kitchen wisdom, lore, anecdotes, and a zest for good food and good times.