Three is NOT a Crowd Chili

They say "three's a crowd." Well, it is most certainly not in my Le Creuset pot! Cold days always inspire me to make a big pot of chili. There are many reasons why I love chili, but the main reason is that you can put anything in chili! This time I omitted the beans, but I made up for it by adding three different kinds of meat: ground beef, ground Italian sausage, and chicken apple sausage. The chicken apple sausage makes it for me! If there is enough veggies and meat in a chili, I don't even miss the beans.

Need

1 lb. ground mild Italian sausage
1 lb. grass fed ground beef
1 package Aidells Chicken Apple Sausage
1.5 c butternut squash peeled and cubed (about 1 small squash)
1 c chopped onion (about 1 medium onion)
2 celery stalks chopped
1 yellow pepper chopped
1 red pepper chopped
1 green pepper chopped
1 jalapeno seeded and chopped
1 large can of fire roasted tomatoes (organic if possible)
1 large can of tomato sauce (organic if possible)
1 c. beef broth
1 can water
3 heaping tbspn chili powder
1.5 heaping tbspn cumin
1 heaping tbspn ancho chili powder
1 tspn garlic powder
1 tspn salt
1 tspn pepper
1 bouillon beef cube

Prepare

Start by browning the Italian sausage and ground beef on medium heat in a large pot. While the meat is cooking, prepare your vegetables. When the meat is brown, add the squash and onions. Throw in a few pinches of chili powder, salt, and pepper while this is cooking. This will really bring out the flavor! Once the onions are translucent in color, add all of the peppers and celery. Cook for another 4-5 minutes.


Add the tomato sauce, fire roasted tomatoes, and beef broth to the pot and set to medium-high. Fill up the tomato sauce can with water to gather the extra tomato flavor and add to the pot. Once this mixture comes to a boil, add the chili powder, cumin, ancho chili, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. If you like your chili spicy, throw in a few pinches of cayenne pepper.



Simmer the chili as long as you can or at least 4 hours. The longer it simmers the better it taste. I usually make it the day before to serve the following night. Because the chicken apple sausage is already cooked, add the sausage about 30 minutes before you plan to serve.


Not into meat? Take out the meat, use vegetable broth instead of beef, and add beans and more vegetables likes zucchini and carrots. The flavor will still be good. If I wasn't trying to get rock hard abs, I would probably add a bottle of beer instead of the water too.(Apparently beer doesn't make rock hard abs though) Enjoy!