Tesco Value Chef: Chilli con Carne

If you want to save money on your food bill, it's important to plan ahead. Shopping lists are important, and you need to make best use of your freezer. Using your freezer, of course, entails taking food out of it to defrost - and once that's done, you've got to use it.

The plan for tonight was a slightly showboating filled butternut squash recipe so I'd got some mince out of the freezer. Plans have a habit of going astray though, don't they?

We ended up popping out to the pub (it was a nice day and we wanted to sit in the garden) and having had some bar snacks with our drinks we didn't really feel hungry enough for dinner. The mince would have been fine until tomorrow, but unfortunately I'm out for the next few evenings because of work so I had to use it up tonight or chuck it away.

There's always a standby in these situations: chilli con carne. Does the internet need another recipe for chilli con carne? Not really. There are thousands of the bloody things, with a load of variations, including a couple of stabs at a "perfect" version by the Guardian and the mighty Heston Blumenthal.

There is a place for it on this website though. It's one of the ultimate value meals: cheap of ingredient and easy to bulk out for large numbers, if you've made too much it also freezes into portions to be re-heated in the microwave later. All the ingredients except for the meat live in the store cupboard - and mince freezes without any noticeable loss of quality. The component parts are always lurking in your kitchen, ready to be made into a delicious dish. It's perfect for the value cooking ethos.

Every cook makes chilli differently, and I suspect that like myself every cook makes it differently each time. I may add other spices and flavours, but I always include cumin, paprika and some sort of chilli heat.

Apart from the flavourings, all you need is an onion, some mince, a tin of tomatoes and a tin of kidney beans.

No butternut squash though. I'll cook that when I'm back from my work commitment.

First, peel and chop an onion and a clove of garlic. My technique for garlic is to crush the clove under the heel of a knife then finely chop what's left - feel free to use a pestle-and-mortar or garlic press if you prefer though.

Now we're going to get the spices going. This part needs a little sleight-of-hand - the spices will release their flavours quickly, but get ruined if overcooked by a matter of seconds. So: Heat some oil in a pan and throw in a teaspoonful of cumin seeds. Whoosh them about by moving the pan in a cheffy motion by the handle. Now add a heaped teaspoonful each of ground cumin, crushed chillies, smoked paprika and cayenne pepper. Whoosh it all about then immediately add the onion and garlic.

Fresh chilli peppers are good, but I didn't have any. The substitutes from store work just as well, and they're easier to control - once you're used to a particular brand of stored heat, in the form of dried chilli pepper, chilli sauce or whatever, you will know how much you like to add.

Stir it all around until everything's coated in the spice mix.

Incidentally, I used my wok today because I tend to use it when making something spicy. I realise that this blog has become a bit of a show-off of all my swanky cooking equipment, but it's really all unnecessary. All you need is one big saucepan, one small saucepan, one really good quality non-stick frying pan with high sides and a couple of good-quality sharp knives - that's all I had until about a year ago.

Now add the mince, season with salt and pepper, and cook for a few minutes, turning regularly with a spatula, until it's brown all over.

This was lean minced steak from the local butcher - lovely quality meat, good enough to make steak tartare, and just £5 per lb (about 500g). At that price, it's just not worth skimping - the value frozen mince brands are mostly water and turn into chilli with a really unpleasant texture and no flavour from the meat. You might just as well use Quorn.

Next, add a tin of tomatoes and a tin of kidney beans. My mum taught me to drain kidney beans in a colander and rinse them thoroughly in cold water, but I have no idea why - the instructions on the tin don't include that step. Old habits die hard though.

Now that there's some liquid in the pan, we can add the liquid flavourings, if you have them: a couple of glugs of Worcestershire sauce (because all good things in life contain a couple of glugs of Worcestershire sauce), a squirt of Capitain Bravo Salsa Gourmet de Chili Habanero and (on a last minute whim) a couple of splashes of Hot-Headz Hickory Liquid Smoke. Those last two came by mail order from Scorchio. I have no connection with the company beyond that of a very happy customer, and I can't recommend them highly enough - if you're serious about your spicy food, you've got to check them out.

Leave it all bubbling away on a low heat until there's hardly any liquid left. You can mostly ignore it, especially if you've been sensible enough to use a non-stick pan, but you will want to stir it every now and then to mix the flavours and make sure it's not sticking to the bottom of the pan. My wok is made of very thin metal and therefore heats very quickly so I used the lowest possible heat on one of the smaller gas rings and it was done in about 35 minutes.

These quantities make four fairly generous portions. If you want to bulk it up without spending much more money, throw in a handful of sliced cup mushrooms. Serve with rice, nachos, tortillas, tacos - whatever you prefer. Personally, I'm quite partial to chilli in a tortilla wrap with sour cream, but that only works if you're eating it straight away.

Tonight, though, I was cooking for storage. My girlfriend likes it just with salad, so two portions have gone into the fridge for her - one for lunch and one for dinner tomorrow.

I then cooked enough rice for two and made two ready meals in tupperwares with the rest. They've gone straight in the freezer and I'll have them at work at some point, heated through in the microwave.

Taste verdict

We both tasted it while it was hot, and it was a good one! It had a proper spicy kick, and the liquid smoke really added a certain something. The quality meat shone through too - don't be tempted to skimp here and get value frozen mince: decent quality mince from the butcher (or the fresh meat counter in the supermarket) is already cheap enough to make this a fantastic value meal.

Financial verdict

250g steak mince - £2.50

An onion - 20p

A tin of tomatoes - 35p

A tin of kidney beans - 45p

Cumin, paprika, chilli flakes, cayenne pepper, a clove of garlic, a splash each of Worcestershire sauce, chilli sauce and liquid smoke, some sort of carbohydrate to serve it with - pennies, from store

88p per portion.

The skinny

Peel/crush/chop a clove of garlic

Peel and chop an onion

Heat oil in a pan

Add cumin seeds and stir for a few seconds

Add spice mix: a teaspoonful each of ground cumin, smoked paprika, cayenne pepper and dried chilli flakes

Mix for a few seconds, then add the chopped onion and garlic

Mix until the onion is soft and transparent but not burned, then add minced beef

Stir around until the mince is browned

Add a tin of tomatoes and a tin of kidney beans

Add a splash each of Worcestershire sauce, (optional) chilli sauce and (optional) liquid smoke