Wendy's Copy Cat Chili and Canning

PRESTO

This year, I decided to treat myself to a new canner. I got a Presto 23 qt. canner and love it!

We have a few freezers and I have been wanting to can enough meat in them to downsize by 1 of the freezers.  What I've been doing is canning just some plain meat, and then some meals also!

Do you can?

Don't you love opening a jar and you already have something either made or partially prepared!?

Today I pressure cooked Chili!

We love chili!

Now, usually I have my own recipe that I always have made and it's really delicious.  I also add macaroni noodles to it, and after it's in the bowl, a bit of shredded cheese is sprinkled on the top.  Yum!!

This time, I tried a recipe I found online.  It's a knock-off (copy cat version) of Wendy's Chili!  Their chili is so good, that I knew I had to try this!  There isn't a Wendy's here, so I don't get to go there that often, but when I do, their chili is a definite must have!

If I can have a batch of soup at home that tastes very similar, I want it!

Here is a photo of it made:

 Here is the recipe I used:

5 lb. hamburger
2 C. onion ~ chopped
2 green peppers ~ chopped
4 stalks celery ~ chopped
2 Tbsp. minced garlc
2 Cans Ranch beans (15 oz)
2 Cans red kidney beans (15 oz) ~ drained
2 Cans Rotel (10 oz)
2 Cans stewed tomatoes (15 oz) ~ chopped
4 Cans tomato sauce (15 oz)
2 pkgs McCormick mild chili pkgs (1.25 oz)

Now, first I must say that the original recipe calls for 7 green peppers.  To me, that is just too much.  We like green peppers, but not that much!  So, I simply adjusted this amount to our personal taste.  That's the great thing about recipes...you can do that!

Now, onto cooking.

Fry the hamburger, drain.  I rinse my hamburger with water, getting rid of even more of the fat than simply draining.  When canning, I like to have as little fat as possible. 

Add rest of ingredients.

Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and let it cook until veges are softened.  I let mine simmer for 2 hours on a low simmer.  I put my into 2 large crock pots for this part.

Next, I put into my prepared jars and canned them!  I won't get into the canning part, as there are so many wonderful sites on how to do this.  For my area, I will say that I can them at 10 lbs. for 90 min.

Here's what I ended up with:

 7 quarts of wonderful Chili!! 

These are going to be great either as a bowl of chili, poured over french fries with some cheese on top, or on hotdogs!!