Mole Firehouse Chili con Carne
I made a Firehouse Chili con carne using the sauce from my Mole Poblano Sauce recipe for our Church Chili CookOff last February and got second place. The sauce is made from a combination of chili peppers, seeds, vegetables and spices, plus a little chocolate. Ive never tried to make mole poblano at home because a true mole takes multiple days to make and requires upwards of 30 ingredients. Just the same, Ive always wanted to spoon the dark and mysterious sauce over succulent chicken, over enchiladas, or burritos and be able to say, I made my own mole And dont judge the taste until you add the chocolate. I think it is good with lots of things. I made a Firehouse Chili con carne using the sauce for our Church Chili CookOff last year.
I made a Firehouse Chili con carne using the sauce from my Mole Poblano Sauce recipe for our Church Chili CookOff last February and got second place. The sauce is made from a combination of chili peppers, seeds, vegetables and spices, plus a little chocolate. Ive never tried to make mole poblano at home because a true mole takes multiple days to make and requires upwards of 30 ingredients. Just the same, Ive always wanted to spoon the dark and mysterious sauce over succulent chicken, over enchiladas, or burritos and be able to say, I made my own mole And dont judge the taste until you add the chocolate. I think it is good with lots of things. I made a Firehouse Chili con carne using the sauce for our Church Chili CookOff last year.
- rice
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- topping:
- 2 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 large onion finely chopped
- 3 tbsp vegetable oil
- 1 tbsp hot pepper sauce
- 2 lb ground beef 80% learn
- 2 large green tomatoes
- 1 onion choppe
- 1 can(s) chili beans
- 1 can(s) tomato sauce
- 1 can(s) stewed tomato cut up
- 3 c mole poblano sauce recipe (see below)
- sever over one:
- cooked macaroni
- mashed potatoes
- 1 tbsp sour cream
- 1 tbsp shredded cheddar cheese
- sliced green onion
- mole poblano sauce:
- 2 tbsp sesame seeds
- 2 tbsp almonds slivered
- 3 clove garlic
- 1/4 c raisins
- 1/2 tsp chipotle chile pepper ground
- 1/4 c chili powder
- 2 tbsp baking chocolate semi-sweet
- 1/4 tsp cinnamon ground
- 1/8 tsp cloves ground
- 1/4 c tomatoes canned italian-style and diced
- 1/4 c panko bread crumbs
- 2 1/2 c chicken broth unsalted
- 1 tsp cilantro fresh
- Carbohydrate 75.9609318438562 g
- Cholesterol 294.655281069268 mg
- Fat 67.3015693161168 g
- Fiber 5.05911240278388 g
- Protein 83.4790949611137 g
- Saturated Fat 19.77736764851 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (656g)
- Sodium 589.647669022678 mg
- Sugar 70.9018194410723 g
- Trans Fat 6.46576049955376 g
- Calories 1261 calories
Step-by-step
- In a 6- to 8-quart Dutch oven cook meat (add salt and pepper) until meat is brown and onion is tender; drain.
- Stir in undrained chili beans, tomato sauce, undrained tomatoes, and the 1 tablespoon bottled hot pepper sauce. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Add the "Mole (Mo-lay) Poblano Sauce" (see other recipe) can be made-a-head use 1 batch Simmer, covered, cooking for 2 hours.
- Serve chili over hot rice, mash potato or cooked macaroni. If you like, top with sour cream, cheddar cheese, and green onions, and pass additional hot pepper sauce.
- Start by dry-toasting the sesame seeds and almonds until they are brown and fragrant. Put them aside in a medium bowl. This was my main dumping bowl, where I put everything once it was done cooking.
- Next, cook a small onion, a clove of garlic and some raisins in vegetable oil. You’ll know the raisins are done when they have plumped up. Once again, I dumped everything in my assembly bowl.
- Mix a decent amount of chili powder (1/4 cup) with more vegetable oil and began toasting the powder. I added a little chipotle powder for extra heat and smokiness. Chipotles aren’t one of the three required chiles in traditional mole, but they were integral to my sauce. Toast the chili powder until it begins to darken and the pan begins to smoke. Turn the heat off and stir in some unsweetened chocolate until melted. I poured the chili and chocolate mixture into my assembly bowl.
- Add the remaining ingredients: diced tomatoes, cloves, cinnamon, salt, pepper, brown sugar and bread crumbs; stir it all together. Pour the mixture into a blender, and add a cup of chicken broth. Run the blender for at least a minute, adding more chicken broth, a splash at a time, if the thick sauce isn’t moving through the blades.
- The sauce will look pretty smooth, but if you taste it, you’ll notice a slight grittiness. So you can pass the sauce through a strainer, pressing to get all of the liquid through. But if you going to use it in my Chili it will be OK like that.
Swapping the traditional dried poblano and ancho chiles for store-bought chili powder alters the entire baseline of this hybrid dish, pushing it away from classic Mexican mole and closer to a spiced Tex-Mex stew. When the chili powder is toasted directly in vegetable oil alongside ground chipotle, capsaicin compounds dissolve into the lipid phase rather than the water phase, distributing heat more evenly across the palate. This oil-roasting technique also breaks down the raw bite of the spices, coaxing out deeper, more earthy undertones before the liquid ingredients hit the Dutch oven.
The Science of Chocolate and Spices
Adding semi-sweet baking chocolate to a simmering pot of beef, tomatoes, and beans does more than just darken the sauce. Cocoa solids contain bitter alkaloids and fats that temper the sharp acidity of canned tomato sauce and green tomatoes. Simultaneously, ground cloves and cinnamon introduce eugenol and cinnamaldehyde, aromatic compounds that bridge the gap between the savory beef fat and the fruity sweetness of raisins. As the mixture simmers covered for two hours, these volatile molecules bind together, creating a denser, more rounded flavor profile that tastes significantly more complex on the second day after the starches have fully retrograded.
- If the blended sauce clogs the blender blades, add chicken broth in quarter-cup increments until the vortex forms properly.
- Straining the sauce through a fine-mesh sieve removes stubborn almond and sesame seed grit, though leaving the solids intact adds rustic body to a heavy chili.
- Store leftover chili in an airtight container for up to four days, as continuous refrigeration allows the cinnamon and clove notes to mellow out completely.
