Butternut Squash and Black Bean Chili

I made a big batch of this stuff for RAMBOTHON, which was this year’s version of ROCKATHON, in which a bunch of people came over to mine and Rob’s house early in the day, and we watched all three old Rambo movies and then walked to the theater to see the fourth. All that blood and guts and violence can really make you hungry, and this chili went really fast. Actually, in honor of RAMBOTHON, I’m renaming this to…

BLOOD AND GUTS CHILI

Okay. This was what I used to feed about 8 people, so by all means, scale back if need be.

You will need:
Olive oil
1 or 2 white onions, diced (pureed! You know the story). I used one big one and one small one
3 chili peppers (I’ll get to this in a minute)
2 medium butternut squashes
Handful of grated carrot
1 big can of pureed tomatoes (oh, how I wish it was summer…)
1 big can of whole peeled tomatoes
2-3 cups vegetable broth, depending on how thick you like your chili
2 cans black beans, drained
2 cans garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drained
Lots and lots of cilantro
Lots of chili powder- 4 or 5 TBS?
Salt

Start out by roasting the squash. Now, you could cube it raw and sauté it in the pot but I don’t have a sharp enough knife to do this without losing a finger. Thus, we get out the saw and cut the squash in half and roast it that way. Think I’m joking? Here.

Yes, I realize this is actually a rutabaga. I didn’t get pictures of Rob cutting squash with the saw, but you get the idea.

Anyway, you’ll cut/saw it in half, scrape out the seeds, drizzle it with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Place the halves cut side up in a 13×9 in pan (or whatever) with an inch or two of water in the pan, and roast it for 35-40 minutes at 450 degrees. Once it’s done and cooled, you’ll be able to slice it and cut the peel away easily. Cut into cubes and set aside.

Okay. Heat some oil in your biggest pot and sauté the onion and carrot together for a few minutes. Add the diced chili peppers.

(Oh, about those. I use these little red guys but it is difficult to tell how spicy they will be. My advice is to buy more than you need and taste them first. Use the leftovers to make salsa or something. Anyway, I used three in this. Also, this is not my photo, and in googling the phrase “red chili pepper,” I got many photos of Anthony Kiedis.)

So, add the diced chili peppers and cook for a minute or two. Stir in the chili powder (which, by the way, is not spicy. Why is that??) until well incorporated, or so it looks.
Add the cans of tomatoes with liquid, the vegetable broth and about ¼ tsp salt. Bring this to a boil and then reduce heat to low. Simmer about 30 minutes, stirring every so often and breaking up the big tomatoes.

After 30 mins, stir in the chickpeas and black beans. I think I really used about 1.5 cans of each, not 2. Add the cubed squash and bring the whole thing back to a boil. Simmer 15 minutes. Remove from heat, add handfuls upon handfuls of chopped cilantro. Season to taste with salt and pepper and serve.

Sorry the pictures are so dark.

This was actually a monumental meal in our house because it revealed that ROB LIKES CHICKPEAS. After insisting for months that he didn’t (having never eaten one.) This changes things. I honestly can’t remember the hot dog count for this one, so I’ll just say MAXIMUM AWESOME and leave it at that.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 7th, 2008 at 10:55 am and is filed under Main Dishes, Soup, Vegan, Vegetarian. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.