Chili

For dinner tonight we had beanless Chili, which started out being a recipe I found from The Clothes Make the Girl http://theclothesmakethegirl.blogspot.com/2009/02/my-favorite-chili-recipe.html, but I can never leave a recipe alone and by the time it was all said and done I had revised it quite a bit.  I have made it with out revisions before and we liked it okay, but it seemed it was lacking, so personally we like the revised version better.  It's really just a matter of taste, they are both good.  Here is the recipe with the revisions I made tonight, oh, and I had to double it to feed my family so please keep that in mind, use your imagination with the veggies,I think carrots would work well too:

Chili

4 onions, chopped                                                                                                                  

 8 cloves garlic, chopped                                                                                                          
 4 lbs. ground beef

spices:
  4 tablespoons chili powder
  4 tablespoons ground cumin
  2 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa
  2 teaspoon dried oregano
  2 teaspoon allspice
  2 tsp salt                                                                          1/2 tsp ground black pepper                                                                                                 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

liquids:
2-14.5 oz. can chopped tomatoes
2-6 oz. tomato paste                                                             32 oz. box beef broth

          Vegetables:

          1 large yellow pepper chopped

          1 large red pepper chopped

          1 large orange pepper chopped

          1 whole bunch of celery, chopped, leaves and all

          2-3  zucchini, diced

           about 1/4 cup leftover chopped olives (could be more, that's all I had)

Directions:
1. Add meat, onions and garlic to large frying pan and cook until meat is browned.  Drain and return to a large stock pot.

2. Blend all the spices in a small bowl. Add to pot and stir well.

3. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, beef broth, and all veggies to the pot, except the zucchini. Stir well to combine it really well.

4. Bring it to a boil, then turn the heat to low and simmer for about 1 hour before adding the zucchini in. Then simmer for another hour, don't short the simmer time, it needs that 2 hours to really develop the flavors.

We served it with guacamole and minced red onion, and a side of fruit.