Dinner · 60 min · american

Copycat Chili (Wendy’s style)

Lean ground beef does the heavy lifting here, with kidney beans rounding it out. An American dinner that takes 60 minutes, start to finish. It is weeknight cooking that still hits your targets — 32 grams of protein per serving. Naturally high-protein, it scales cleanly if you are cooking for more than one.

Ingredients

• 1.5 lb Lean ground beef
• 2 cans Kidney beans
• 1 can Diced tomatoes
• 1 can Tomato sauce
• 1 Onion
• 1 Green bell pepper
• 3 tbsp Chili powder
• 2 tsp Ground cumin
• 1 tsp Garlic powder
• 1 tsp Unsweetened cocoa powder

Steps

1. Brown the beef hard in a heavy pot, breaking it into small crumbles; let it sit undisturbed a few minutes to build fond.
2. Add onion and pepper and cook until soft and sweet, scraping up every browned bit.
3. Bloom the chili powder, cumin, and garlic in the fat for 60 seconds — dry spices wake up in heat, not water.
4. Stir in tomatoes, tomato sauce, beans, and the secret spoonful of cocoa; it deepens everything without tasting like chocolate.
5. Simmer low for 45 minutes with the lid ajar, stirring now and then, until it turns thick and brick-red.
6. Salt at the end, not the beginning; canned beans bring their own, and you want to taste where you land.
7. Rest 10 minutes off the heat. Chili is always better the next day, so make this the night before if you can.

Build my plan

Share this recipe

Know someone who would love this? Send it their way.

Copy link

You might also like