Recipe for Vegetarian Chili made with Quorn
Makes about 8 generous servings
Don’t worry if you can’t get kidney beans in chili sauce – plain is fine and just add extra chilli powder. Similarly, the quantities don’t need to be very precise so don’t worry if your Quorn comes in slightly larger or smaller packs.
1 and a half tbsp Olive oil
2 x 350g (2 x 12oz) packets of quorn mince
2 x 400g (2 x 14oz) tins red kidney beans in chilli sauce
2 x 400g (2 x 14oz) tins chopped tomatoes
2 peppers, diced (ideally two different colours e.g 1 red and 1 green)
2 large onions, diced
2 tsp mild chili powder (you can add more later)
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce or vegetarian equivalent
1 tbsp tomato ketchup
End of a teaspoon of chinese five spice
1 tsp smoked paprika
freshly ground black pepper
First, find a very large pan as there are a lot of ingredients here and you’ll need room to stir.
Heat 1 tbsp of the olive oil and fry the onion and peppers on a low heat for about 10 minutes. You want them to start to caramelise a little but not brown.
Add the other half a tablespoon of olive oil (or a good glug) to the pan and add the Quorn. Put in the chili powder, paprika, lots of black pepper and the chinese five spice and stir for a minute or so.
Add all of the other ingredients into the pan, stir and simmer on a very low heat for the next hour. You’ll need to stir it occasionally or it will stick but otherwise it doesn’t need much attention. About half way through taste the chili and add some more chili powder to get it to the right level of heat for your taste buds. I also tend to add a bit more of some of the other seasonings at this point depending on what I feel is lacking (and feel free to fiddle with the recipe and add bits and pieces of other spices that you fancy). Note that I haven’t added any salt at all as there tends to be high quantities of salt in the canned beans.
Cool, divide into portions and put some of it in your fridge to eat in the next few days and rest in the freezer.