Buffalo Chicken Chili and Beer Bread

I have always loved chili.  I don't think there is anything better on a cold winter night than a big, steaming bowl of delicious chili.  Unfortunately, chili isn't one of those foods one could call healthy. While not everything I make is on the light side, as I've mentioned before, I've learned to cook lighter when I can.  I substitute lighter, healthier ingredients, and most of the time I end up with a much healthier and equally delicious dish.  Chili is something that you can easily lighten up by using chicken or turkey instead of beef.  I've tried a few different chicken chilis: some white chili that doesn't have a tomato sauce base; and some traditional chilis that simply use chicken instead of beef in the recipe.  All were good, but not what I would call great.  The recipe I'm posting today is sort of a combo.  I pretty much googled a bunch of chicken chili recipes and developed a hybrid of what I found.  If you like chili and you like chicken wings then this is the chili for you.  This is the perfect dish to serve for Sunday football with some freshly baked beer bread.  Beer bread is quite possibly the easiest bread you could possibly make.  It's only three ingredients and is the perfect side for any chili.


Buffalo Chicken Chili

1 large onion
3 stalks celery
2 large carrots
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp butter
salt to taste
2 lbs ground chicken (you could use shredded instead if you prefer)
2 tbsp paprika
2 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp ground chipotle peppers (or to taste)
1/2 cup buffalo sauce
1 (28oz) can crushed tomatoes
1 (12 oz) can diced tomatoes
2 cans white beans (I used great northern beans, but you can use white kidney or cannellini beans)

In a large pot or dutch oven, brown ground chicken and add spices. Remove from pot. Dice the onion, celery and carrots.  In the same pot, heat olive oil and add veggies, sweating until all are tender.  Put the ground chicken back in and mix together. Add buffalo sauce, crushed tomatoes and diced tomatoes, mix thoroughly.  Cook on low in dutch oven for 2 - 3 hours or transfer to crockpot and cook on low. Serve with sour cream and crumbled blue cheese and a side of beer bread.

  Beer Bread

3 cups self rising flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 bottle beer (the lighter the beer, the less the bread will taste like beer...I use Yuengling Lager)

Mix all ingredients in large mixing bowl.  Spray loaf pan with cooking spray and transfer batter to pan.  Bake at 350 for about 50 minutes.  When bread is finished, remove from pan immediately and butter the top of the loaf.  Serve warm with butter.