Chilli and potato bake

We're trying to use up some of the older stuff out of the freezer at the moment and yesterday evening I took out some steak mince for supper this evening.  The Woo and I decided on a nice hot chilli.  We also have some new potatoes to use up so I've decided to do a sort of chilli and potato bake.

First I'll talk about the rest of the day.  I did a bit of running around this morning after dropping The Woo off at work then took the hounds or a good long walk over the fields.  The mushrooms are starting to appear all over the place and I have big plans for some of the parasols whose locations I've made a mental note of already.  I keep revisiting the site where I found a lovely puffball a couple of years ago but so far no joy.  Fingers crossed if this weather keeps up as it is!

This afternoon I spent a couple of hours on the allotment.  I have now dug up, root by root, all of the three foot high docks.  The rest I will strim and either compost or dig in ready for next year.  I have a couple of virgin beds that I might try and put a few bits in over the autumn/winter but I'll see what the weather does first. Apparently we're due a fairly harsh frost next week so that should help beak up the soil if I can get it all dug over before then!

The frost is good news on the foraging front, though, as it means I can collect some rose hips and haws for some rose hip syrup and haw-sin sauce.

Now back to the food!

I have made the chilli from all the odds and sods in the fridge.  That's the beauty of food like this; you don't have to rigorously stick to the same old recipe all the time. Tonight it's onion, carrot, celery and garlic softened in a little oil.  Added to this were a few chopped mushrooms, some tomato puree, oregano, half a dozen chopped birdseye chillies and some salt and pepper.  All cooked for a bit then in went a good lug of Dr Pepper (well it's worth a try and there was no wine about!), a carton of chopped tomatoes and the same amount again of water.  In went the browned mince, stirred in the get it all mixed up and then brought to the boil and left to simmer covered for a while.

I often add a lug of balsamic vinegar to mine and then balance the flavour with a cube or two of dark chocolate.  I did this today as there was chocolate in the fridge (Sam's not home!).  It gives the chilli a bit of depth I think.

After it had cooked out for a while I added a chopped yellow pepper as there was one knocking about that needed using and a small tin of cannellini beans.  Any beans will do.  I'm not a great fan of kidney beans as I think they tend to go a bit soft and pappy but this is all about using what's in the cupboard.

Once the potatoes were cooked I crushed then gently into a shallow dish, added a few spots of butter and a small carton of single cream, sprinkled a liberal amount of grated cheese over the top and then covered this with the chilli.  More cheese grated on top and then into a 180* oven until hot through with lovely golden brown melted cheese on top!

This worked really well.  The Dr Pepper gave it a bit of a barbecue back flavour and the potato and bean combination was a good carb hit.  This would be a great dish for bonfire night maybe?  It's good, old-fashioned warming autumnal comfort food.  I think next time I will use pumpkin or sweet potato as a base to make it even more seasonal.