Low Effort Chili

Work in progress. Made it for the first time this weekend, based on ideas I’ve been tossing around.

Ingredients

• 1 bag (20oz) Hurst’s HamBeens (15-bean soup mix) (see Notes)
• 1 lb & change ground pork (or ground beef, make it 70/30 or 80/20)
• 1½ white onions, diced
• 3 medium carrots, diced
• 1 bell pepper, diced (color of your choice)
• 6 cloves garlic, peeled
• 6-8 dry chile peppers of various varieties (see Notes)
• 2+ tsp cumin
• 1+ tsp chili powder
• salt (salt it like you want)
• 2 tsp or more beef Better than Bouillon
• 1 can tomato paste

Equipment

• Food processor
• Water kettle
• Dutch oven/cocotte

Preparation

1. About half an hour before you start cooking, dump the bag of HamBeens in a large heatproof bowl, sort them to make sure there’s no rocks. Pour at least a liter of boiling water over them, probably adding another half liter shortly thereafter, and let them rehydrate. Start your oven for 250°F, ideally on convection.
2. While the beans are soaking, rinse, then tear the stem end off the dry chiles and dump the seeds. They won’t blend well in the next step, so it’s best to just get them out of the way. Put the stemmed & seeded chiles in another heatproof bowl, and pour additional boiling water to cover. Let sit for roughly 20 minutes to rehydrate.
3. Chop all the vegetables but the garlic. Put the garlic cloves in the food processor’s bowl; drain the rehydrated chiles, add them to the food processor’s bowl; add BTB & ~½cup water, cover, and process until smooth. Set aside for now.
4. Heat dutch oven over a medium-high heat; once hot, place the ground meat, distributing in an even layer. Salt, and let sit until browning is setting in. Break up the meat, redistributing to get the bulk at least browned, or lightly cooked, then set aside in a bowl.
5. Add the onions to the hot rendered fat from the meat, stirring to coat; add some salt, stir, and cover. Let sit to let the initial steam pressure help the onions through to translucent, then uncover. After some of the liquid has steamed off, add the carrots & bell peppers.
6. Cook the vegetables until suitably sautéed; once ready, add the beans, and add boiling water from a kettle to just cover the beans & vegetables, plus a margin. Not looking for huge headroom (the soak has helped, and we’ll add more liquid later) but rather for just enough to make the initial boil work.
7. Bring to a slow boil with the lid mostly on, and keep the pot at boiling for 20 minutes to complete the initial cooking stage.
8. Turn off the heat on the dutch oven and re-add the ground pork, as well as now adding the blended chiles, cumin, & chili powder at this point. Stir gently to incorporate.
9. Cover the pan, and place it on the middle shelf of your oven, still at 250°F.
10. Bake at that temperature for the next four to five hours, checking occasionally. Add liquid as needed, and in the last hour or so, stir in the can of tomato paste.

Notes

On the bean mix, any many-many bean mix will do; there’s 13-bean mixes and 15-bean mixes, you want to make sure there’s a fair proportion of peas and lentils that will break down further as part of the cooking. The HamBeens mix is just very reliable and of good quality, for a decent price.

On the chiles, pick the varieties you like. I recommend at least two, just because every chile I’ve had has been strong in one note and weak in another. I like Guajillo & New Mexico together; you can even throw in more than I used here. This dish can soak up a lot of chiles.