I love chili on a chili fall day ;) This is a basic recipe that is amazing on it's own but can also be pimped out to your liking. Michael likes to add celery but I am anti-celery unless it has peanut butter and raisins on it :) You could also add a zucchini, red, yellow, or orange bell pepper, butternut squash, etc... This is also a recipe where you get to call upon your inner chef. I'm a flavor lover, so I usually go heavy on the spices and add a little more than what's listed here. But start with these amounts, let your chili simmer for a couple minutes to let the spices incorporate, and then test it and go from there. I know this recipe looks like it has a lot of ingredients, but besides chopping the onion and whatever veggies you decide on, the rest is just canned goods and spices that get thrown in. Plus it's a one-pot meal! My FAVORITE!
If you want to get really creative, sometimes Michael and I turn it into a cornbread-n-chili casserole. Reduce the simmer time for the chili to 5 minutes, pour into a large casserole dish, top with the your favorite cornbread batter (stay tuned for a cornbread recipe -still trying to perfect it), and bake according to the cornbread's instructions. Super yummy and fun!
