Butternut squash, kale and green tomato chili with homemade tortillas and chips

This is a dish that can easily be made vegetarian, simply omit the ground beef. This recipe or lack of recipe came about by me simply seeing what produce I had in my fridge that had to be used up. I had tomatoes that I knew were done turning and were still half green, kale and peppers that had to be eaten today. The butternut squash adds a sweetness to offset the tartness of the green tomatoes. The peppers from the garden all have a distinct taste that add layers of heat and the pinto and kidney beans had soaked for 24 hours and slow cooked for about 4 hours and I wanted to use half tonight and freeze the rest. Add in some grass fed ground beef and I had everything I needed for a delicious chili. I already had wheat flour out from something else I was baking so I decide to make wheat tortilla chips for the chili instead of my yogurt cornbread. This is what I try and really teach my clients how to do, look at your inventory and be able to come up with a healthy and delicious meal.

Ingredients

  • Kidney beans soaked for 24 hours, remove any white film on top, cooked for ~ 4 hours
  • pinto beans soaked for 24 hours, remove any white film on top, cooked for ~4 hours
  • grassfed ground beef browned
  • variety of peppers finely chopped
  • mixture of red and green and inbetween tomatoes chunked and diced
  • Onion finely chopped
  • garlic minced
  • kale finely chopped
  • butternut squash roasted then diced
  • water
  • cumin
  • chili powder
  • oregano
  • spanish paprika
  • unrefined sea salt
  • pepper
  • whole milk sour cream or greek yogurt optional
  • grassfed cows milk cheese optional
  • homemade tortilla chips optional
  • lime optional

Instructions

  • What I sometimes like to do when I am just throwing together a dish with what I need to use up, is I get everything out and organize from there the order I need to cook things. My beans and meat were already cooked so I started with the onions and sauteed them in a butter and olive oil combo and then added some garlic.
  • In a large pot, on medium high heat I cooked down the tomatoes making a quick tomato sauce and added the onions and garlic. I then added the peppers.
  • I started slowly adding water bringing it to the consistency I wanted. I don't think broth is necessary for chili. I added the squash and kale followed by the meat and beans. I then started seasoning it with my spices. I happen to love spanish paprika or smoked paprika, and I think it adds a great flavor to the chili. It's one of those spices that I try to sneak into as many things as possible. Because I used water and not broth, I did add a lot more salt. The great thing is that I know that the salt in my chili is unrefined sea salt full of awesome minerals, unlike the refined salt used in most broths and stocks. Having complete control over your ingredients is fantastic. Continue to season until you are happy with how it tastes! If you don't have fresh peppers, I suggest using red pepper flakes for the spice. I like my chili to be really chunky and have very little broth, great thing about using water and not broth is you can easily add more especially as it cooks down!
  • I served my chili with cheese, sour cream and tortilla chips. I also squeeze a bit of lime and mix it in right before serving but that is a personal preference and I only do it if I have lime on hand.
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