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Sunday Night Soups: Beef Chili con Carne With Meat (Gurgling Cod Remix)

Posted by The Gurgling Cod, September 8, 2007 at 5:00 PM

Editor's note: This entry marks the first in a series called Sunday Night Soups. Our friend The Gurgling Cod will be concocting them and posting them. And, yeah, it's Saturday as we post this, but that's so you have some time to shop for and cook this recipe. Enjoy! —Adam

Welcome to Sunday Night Soups, where each week Serious Eats will offer a soup appropriate to the week’s Sunday Night Football game on NBC. This week’s game sees Eli, the other Manning, and his New York Giants travel to Dallas to take on the Cowboys. The Texas venue basically demands beef, and a lot of beef, and New York has at least two Koreatowns, and that’s enough of an excuse to make this Korean-spiced chili.

The origin of this chili was Craig Claiborne’s recipe in the New New York Times Cookbook, but necessity dictated a few audibles the first time I made it (Korean red pepper powder for chili powder, and Quaker oats for flour), and they worked out well enough that I’ve been making it like this ever since.

This is more of a stew than a soup, but it is as close as you can get to steak you can eat with a spoon. Starting with cubed—rather than ground—beef produces a texture that is much more interesting than most chilis. You can adjust the heat up or down, depending on your taste, but if the heat seems too much as you cook, add two or three tablespoons of honey.

Craig Claiborne’s Beef Chili con Carne with Meat (Gurgling Cod Remix)

Ideally, cook the night before, and reheat the next day.

Ingredients

5 lbs lean chuck roast (so called “seven bone” is a good cut—do not be beguiled into buying a cut that is too expensive or too lean)
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup coarse Korean red pepper powder
1/2 cup Quaker oatmeal
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
2 teaspoons dried oregano
10 to 12 garlic cloves, chopped
4 cups beef broth (traditional—I have come to prefer less-salty chicken broth in a box, such as Pacific brand)
Sherry
Diced onions
Sour cream
Grated cheddar cheese (preferrably Cabot extra-sharp)

Procedure

1. Dice meat into 1-inch cubes. Meanwhile, simmer broth in soup pot. Brown meat in a large skillet.

2. Combine chili powder and oatmeal in a food processor; process until oatmeal is pretty floury.

3. Coat meat with chili-oat mixture. Rub cumin and oregano together over meat, mix. Add garlic.

4. Add to simmering broth. If needed, add water to almost cover. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, partly covered, 3 to 4 hours, adding water as needed.

5. Stir now and then, making sure bottom does not burn and stick. Cook until very tender, but not falling apart. Add sherry, if desired, near the end of cooking.

6. Serve with Beans (recipe below), onions, grated cheddar, and sour cream.

Beans

Ingredients

1 pound pinto beans
1 large onion
1/2 pound salt pork

Procedure

1. Soak beans for an hour. Drain. Rinse, cover with at least 2 inches of water, and add pork and diced onions.

2. Cook 2 to 3 hours. Do not burn. Remove salt pork before serving.

Vegetarian variation: Lie to them about the pork.

About the author:
The Gurgling Cod, aka 'Fesser, writes The Gurgling Cod, a blog that is primarily concerned with food.

7 Comments | Tags: chili, soups, stews, Sunday Night Soups