No Chunks of Tomato- Recipe
-I just love chili, but I dislike chunks or pieces of tomato, so I figured out how to make my chili without them. If you like hunks of tomato, it can be altered to accommodate your tastes. When I was a kid, I wouldn’t eat anything I could see a chunk of tomato in. This instantly told me I wouldn’t like it. I loved ketchup and tomato soup, so it’s not the taste of tomato, it’s the pieces. It was a texture issue and defined taste of the tomato, I didn’t care for. Whenever I cook with tomato sauce or other canned tomato product I have to put sugar in it, to kill the acids from the tomatoes or it disagrees with my digestion. Give this simple recipe a try and even see if your kids will eat it, ya’ never know.
This is a very easy to make meal. It is also a very meaty chili, which my family loves.
You will need: 6-8 quart stock pot-Stick/Immersion hand mixer or blender 
approx. 2 lbs ground beef
Onion- sm-med fresh or dehydrated 1/4 cup (I love having dehydrated onion in my cupboard, it never goes bad)
3 large cans of Stewed Tomatoes or equivalent (diced, sliced or whole)
3 small cans of Dark Red Kidney beans
1 heaping tsp sugar
2-3 tbsp Chili Powder
Brown your ground beef with some salt and pepper to taste along with your your onion in your stock pot. (Chop onion into small pieces or use dehydrated chopped onion). After browning your ground beef drain off all liquid from it. return your pot
Open your cans of stewed tomatoes and pour most of the liquid only over your ground beef if your using a stick mixer to puree or add them to your blender. I use a stick mixer because it’s much easier to clean and I can place it directly into the can to puree. Removing the liquid gives me enough room to immerse my stick mixer into the can. You can mix or blend it as much as you like. I like to make sure there are no chunks, a few small pieces are fine, they will cook up and fall apart. After I have added all the tomatoes to the pot I add sugar, stir well and then my dark red kidney beans. Open your cans and drain and rinse them before adding to the pot. Add your chili powder (2 tbsp) and bring it to a boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 1/2 hour, taste and add more chili powder if desired and continue simmering for at least another half an hour. Keep the temp low enough not make it boil or begin sticking to the bottom of your pot. You can check this by removing the cover after about 10 minutes and see how hard it it bubbling, you should only see intermittent bubbles, not continuous bubbles.
Chili Suggestions
Want a smaller or larger portion? Simply reduce or increase your ingredients equally which is very easy to do.
If you do not mind chunks of tomato, use diced or sliced stewed tomatoes. You will need to add another can or two in order to give you enough liquid for your chili. You can also add tomato sauce or a cup of tomato juice if your liquids are low.
Chili Baker -Take a hot baked potato, cut in half long ways, open it up, cross cut it and cover with shredded cheddar cheese, then top with chili.
Stretch It Out – Make your chili go further by adding boiled diced potatoes. Boil 3 large potatoes to a point they are cooked yet still firm enough not to fall apart, like you would to make potato salad. Let them cool before cutting into small pieces, then add to your chili. Adding raw chopped potato to your chili mixture will take several hours to cook completely through and you will need to have the heat under your pot much higher to cook them. Much easier to add potatoes that are already cooked.