Chillllay Babay

Even though its August and hot out, I wanted Chili tonight. I am also going out of town this weekend and chili is something my son can easily heat up for himself (my husband will also be here but he is not much of a cook). There are zillions of recipes out there for chili and mine is nothing new or innovative. That said, I really like it and its easy to make and its zero smart points per serving if you use the 99%ff ground chicken or turkey.I use the instant pot but if you don't have one, you can just use a nice dutch oven to cook it up in. I doubled up on it tonight so we would have plenty, but I find  it will make 4-6 nice healthy portions without doubling. I love to eat mine over a bowl of riced cauliflower. It bulks it up without adding too many calories.

Lots of cans!

Amy's everyday chili

Ingredients:

16oz package of 99%ff ground chicken or turkey

1 can kidney beans rinsed and drained

1 can black beans rinsed and drained

1 small onion chopped

3-4 cloves of garlic (if I'm feeling lazy I used the chopped frozen cubes)

1 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes

1 15oz can of diced tomatoes (or tomato sauce) I like the texture of the diced tomatoes but sometimes I use the sauce, my son likes that better.

2T chili powder

1T cumin

dash of garlic powder

salt and pepper to taste

Spray oil

1. I set the instant pot to saute and let it heat up.When it gets hot, I use my misto olive oil mister and spritz some in to coat the pan. I throw in the diced onions and let them soften about 5 minutes. 

2. Once onions are soft, I throw in my frozen garlic cubes, let them heat up and then add the ground chicken or turkey. I make sure its cooked all the way through and browned a little. When you use the instant pot though, if you get little bits stuck to the bottom of the pot it might give you problems coming to pressure, so make sure that nothing is stuck.

3. Once that is done, hit the off button on the saute feature. Throw in the beans, the tomatoes and then the spices and your salt and pepper. I don't stir any of it.

4. Put your lid on, hit manual and enter 30 minutes.

5. Most of the time I just let the pressure naturally release, but sometimes I get impatient.

All the ingredients are zero points, unless you use tomato sauce, you might have to account for a point or two per serving if you use sauce.

heating it up to cook up the onions

Browing the chicken

I love this stuff. I get it at Trader Joes. They also make ginger. Its the best stuff!!

Just dump everything in

I got impatient tonight and I used the quick release method. It made my whole house smell like delicious chili. It was like a chili diffuser. The only problem was it was so tasty, I ate entirely too much.

I had some fresh corn and I crunched up some  Good Thins corn chips. Yummmmm!

Black Bean Corn Goodness

A little mis en place 

I have been making this salad for well over 20 years. I think I read a recipe in a magazine, never wrote it down but made up my own version of it. It's not rocket science but its very good, on its own, on some chips or even on a regular salad. Its the thing my family asks for at bbq's. Its pretty easy, and does not use a lot of ingredients. I always forget to buy the cilantro though. According to 23 and me, I am not one of those people who thinks cilantro tastes like soap. Lucky gal that I am. If you have a genetic soap taster in your midst, I think you could leave it out. It would still be good. As far as weight watchers points go, the only thing in it with points is the olive oil.

So here it goes: My Famous Bean Salad

Ingredients:

1 can black beans rinsed and drained

3 ears of corn, cooked and then all the kernels cut off

5 tomatoes-diced (you can use any kind of tomatoes, I even threw in a bunch of the tiny grape tomatoes from my son's garden).

1/2 cup cilantro diced

1 medium red onion diced

Juice from 3 limes (you want at the very least 1/3 cup of lime juice. I like more)

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

2T EVOO

Salt and Pepper to taste

Basically you just throw it all in a nice pretty bowl, cover it, let it sit in the fridge for a bit and eat. It tastes a lot better after it has hung out in the fridge for a few hours. I like to make it the night before we will eat it to give all the flavors time to marinate.

So as far as smart points go, I figure this makes 8 servings and its 1 point for the olive oil. 

Enjoy!!!!!!

corn and beans, beans and corn....

My son contributed these cuties from his garden. Sometimes his hobbies are helpful.

Voila- Good enough to eat.

I had to taste some to make sure it was good.

link to print recipe