It’s rainy and grey outside. Perfect weather for a big pot of soul-warming chili. And so it happened; I cooked the first chili of the season marking autumn’s official arrival.

Sorry to those of you mourning the end of summer, but I love this time of year. When it gets so chilly you have to light the fireplace (a fireplace DVD counts, right?) and lots of candles at night. When the colors of nature get all warm and earthy. When you cook hearty stews, soups and casseroles while the rain hits the window pane and the wind howls. Wonderful!

I took a different route this time. Normally I’d use store-bought ground beef, but I decided to put some work into it and I ran stewing steak through the meat grinder. Big difference! Huge difference in flavor. Now is not the time to show restraint in spices. Quite the contrary, you have to use a liberal amount when making chili. I did. And it was out of this world good.

Ingredients:

Chili:

2 pounds stewing steak (or ground beef)
1 large onion (mine was a sweet onion)
1 green bell pepper
2 garlic cloves
1 can diced tomatoes
2 cups beef broth
1 can tomato paste
1 tbsp maple syrup
1 tbsp worcestershiresauce
1 tbsp white vinegar
2 bay leaves
1 tbsp brown sugar

Seasoning:

1 tbsp hot chili powder (or 2 tbsp medium)
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp cocoa powder
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1 tbsp Lawry’s seasoned salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1 tsp onion powder
2 tsp paprika powder
2 tsp oregano

Optional: jalapeños (topping)
Optional: kidney beans


Directions:

Told you I used a liberal amount. I bet you’re real glad I’ve put it all in one storyboard! Combine all spices listed in the Seasoning list and give it a good stir.

I only had a sweet onion on hand, it worked beautifully. Finely mince the onion, bell pepper (mine were small, so I used two) and grate the garlic.

It was time the beast—as I so lovingly call it—made an appearance.

I had 2 pounds stewing steak (riblappen for the Dutchies) in the fridge. It was perfect for the job. You could also finely mince it. Or use ground beef instead.

But I decided to make my own ground beef. After all, what’s the fun in being a foodie if you can’t make stuff like this yourself? I cut it in coarse pieces.

And there it went.

And I ended up with a big pile of this. I thought it was still a bit too coarse.

So I ran it through the meat grinder once more.

It was perfect like this!

Heat some oil or butter and sauté the onion for 2 minutes before adding the bell pepper and garlic. Give it 4 more minutes.

Add the ground beef and cook it ‘til it loses its rawness. Don’t overcook it or you’ll change the structure of the meat too much!

Add the tomato puree and spices and give it 30 seconds while stirring it into the ground beef. Pour in the diced tomatoes and beef broth.

Normally I add Molasses to dishes like these, but I was fresh out. I hate it when that happens. Unfortunately it’s not an item you can simply run to the store for here. So I opted for maple syrup. It worked like a charm!

Also add the worcestershire sauce, brown sugar and vinegar. I used Unca Duke’s geaux jus. I’m gonna cry when I run out of that stuff. Throw in two bay leaves, bring to a boil, pop the lid on and simmer over low heat for 2 hours. The longer you simmer, the better it’ll get.

But I was hungry. And I have the attention span of a fish stick. Two hours were all the waiting I could handle.

After those two hours I took the lid off and cooked the sauce for 30 minutes over low heat, giving the liquid a chance to cook down.

Those 30 minutes gave me the exact sauce consistency I was looking for. Discard the bay leaves.

If you hail from Texas, you might want to turn your head. It’ll get ugly now.

I drained the kidney beans, added them to the chili and gave the whole shebang another 15 minutes to simmer and bubble. And if you think this is bad, you’ll probably cry when you learn I usually add corn, too. I’m not completely heartless, so I omitted it this time. But this time only!

I would have given it another hour but I was hungry. Real hungry. Can you blame me?

It was really all that and a side order of chili-cheese fries. I know I shot it in a pristine white bowl looking all classic and pretty. But get this; off camera I ate it poured over crispy French fries and topped with an indecent amount of cheddar and jalapeños.

Just sayin’.