Friday, May 21, 2010

Rachel Rays White Lightning Chili..Tweaked

I wanted to make my best friend and her family White Chicken Chili, well I used to have an awesome recipe and thought I had it posted on her, no.. I just have a picture of it in a damn cup. I was not a happy person that day lol. SO I thought woohoo I can buy a new cookbook. I was starving had not eating and love looking at cookbooks.. needless to say after an hour of doing so and nothing catching my eye I went to that little help kiosk in the middle of all Barnes and Noble stores. I mentioned that I was looking for a good Chicken Chili recipe and the Girl chirped up that Rachel Ray has one and they make it almost weekly. Who am I to say no.. she got me the book, I flipped through it and thoughts why not give it a try, so I bought Rachel Ray 30-minute meals. and on page 142 is White Lightning Chili.
The next week, we were in her Mom's kitchen whipping up a batch with a few tweaks, My favorite MIA recipe took a generous helping of Shredded Pepper Jack Cheese that was added at the end, it added heat and a creaminess to the chili, we added an entire block of shredded pepper jack to this recipe. That was the only changes I believe we made to the recipe. Now after having it, it was more soup like to me, even with the addition of all that cheese, it was alot of broth, I would definitely increase the cans of beans  to about 2 cans of beans to 2 lbs of meat.. make it a more thicker and chunkier chili. Otherwise it was damn good!! and everyone loved it, and my Preggo best friend just kept wanting to drink the broth haha..

White Lightning Chili Tweaked :

1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 lbs ground Turkey breast
1 lg yellow onion, chopped
1 Serrano or jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 Tbsp ground cumin
a palm full chopped fresh cilantro
a couple shakes cayenne pepper sauce
2 cans (14 oz each) no fat low sodium chicken broth
1 can (15 oz) Great Norther/white kidney beans, drained
Coarse salt, to taste
Crushed tortilla chips for topping

Heat oil in deep skillet or pot over medium-high heat. Add turkey and cook for a couple of minutes, keeping the ground meat moving. Add onion, minced hopper, garlic, seasonings and cilantro. Reduce heat to medium and cook together for 5 minutes to soften and sweeten onion. Add broth and beans. Add salt to taste. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer ( at this point I added almost 2 lbs of shredded pepper jack cheese in to the chili and stirred to melt it)until you're ready to serve.

Top bowls with crushed tortilla chips, or any chili toppings you like.  we Topped it with chopped green onions and used tortilla chips as scoops hehe it was very tasty! I will make this again! Tweaking as I go of course!

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