Friday Food: Chilli Beef Soup

It's all about the soup here.  Autumn is the perfect time for sipping a spicy rich broth. if you don't actually read the recipe before you decide to cook the soup, then you won't realise it needs 2 1/2 hours in a slow oven. So, this is a soup to simmer away all afternoon and eat for tea with some crusty bread. There's hardly any actual hands on cooking and it mostly potters along all by itself.

I used hot dried chilli rather than mild chilli powder: some like it hot. You can leave out the cannellini beans if you are so inclined. I was not.

I don't have a casserole that can cook on the stove top and then go into the oven, so I had to use a saucepan and then I transferred it to a 3 litre casserole dish. 

 

Chilli Beef Soup   serves 4

• 1 tbspn olive oil
• 2-4 cloves of garlic, crushed
• 1 brown onion, chopped
• 250g stewing steak (chuck or blade) diced
• 2 tspn mild chilli powder (or 1 tspn hot chilli flakes)
• 1/2 tspn ground cumin
• 400g tin diced tomatoes
• 5 cups beef stock
• 350g pumpkin, chopped into 1cm cubes
• 1 tbspn balsamic vinegar
• 400g tin cannellini beans
• parsley for decoration if you will

 

Preheat oven to 150*C (130 fan forced)

Heat the oil in your chosen pan to medium and fry the onion and garlic, stirring for 5 minutes to soften.

Increase the heat to high and add the beef, stirring and cooking for 5 minutes more.

Add the cumin and chilli and fry off for a further 2 minutes.

Now add the stock, tomatoes, pumpkin,

and balsamic vinegar.

Bring to the boil and then the soup goes into the oven for 2- 2 1/2 hours. Cover the top loosely with baking paper or foil. When the beef is tender, add the beans and a heat for 5-10 minutes more.

Season to taste and serve. This spicy soup freezes well and it is easy to double the recipe. It is a hearty soup and reasonably inexpensive.

 

Comments

[2paw]

Oops, I forgot to say this is from the Winter Family Circle 2012 Magazine!!!

[Jan]

Looks delicious. If you have a slow cooker the early prep part could be cooked on top of stove and then everything cooked in slow cooker. I reckon that would work too. Am planning on the white bean soup from that magazine next week.

I think I'd use blade. Chuck steak is not a favourite of mine at all.

[Monica]

That looks yummy! I wish we could taste things that we see on computer monitors. :)

[Ann]

Yummy soup. I used to love beef soup & cook it often in winter. I usually cook soup with meat in a slow cooker so that I don't have to watch over it.

[mrspao]

Everyone else has echoed what I've been thinking about the slow cooker... :)