Ina Garten’s Chicken Chili is a great chili for a chilly day! It’s a good, hearty chili recipe that feeds a large crowd.
This chili is pure comfort food. It’s nice to eat a chicken chili– one without beef or beans– that is just simply packed with chicken, tomatoes and other veggies.
Ina Garten’s Chicken Chili is a non-traditional chili. It has tons of yellow and red bell peppers as well as fresh basil. It’s spiced up lightly with chili powder, cumin, red pepper flakes and cayenne pepper. Add more cayenne for heat.
How to make Ina Garten’s Chicken Chili:
This is a super easy chili recipe to make. Onions and garlic are sautéed in a large pot. Bell peppers and spices are added in. Then you’ll add in a lot of crushed canned plum tomatoes and fresh basil. That’s all simmered for 30 minutes before adding cooked chicken and simmering a bit more.
Sometimes I like to add a good spoonful of my favorite barbecue sauce to this chili recipe to add a little sweet flavor to it. Try it, it’s good!
What I love about this recipe:
It feeds a crowd! Ina Garten’s Chicken Chili recipe makes a hearty 12 servings. I almost always make this particular recipe when I’m having people over to watch games on football Sundays. It easily feeds a hungry bunch, and everyone is happy to eat a chicken chili recipe! Great job in creating this recipe, Ina Garten (also known as Barefoot Contessa)!
If 12 servings is too much for you, it’s okay to cut the recipe in half.
Served up family-style with a sprinkle of cheddar cheese, a dollop of sour cream and crushed tortilla chips or corn chips, this is a great chili recipe.
Here are a few more chili recipes you might enjoy:
- Beef and Dark Beer Chili
- California Chili
- Pumpkin Chili
- Slow Cooker Chili
- Spicy Vegetarian Chili
- Halftime Chili
- Thick and Beefy Beanless Chili
- Spicy Turkey Chili
If you happen to be following the Weight Watchers WW plan, you will find a link to the WW Points on the recipe card below.
Ina Garten's Chicken Chili
Ingredients
- 8 cups chopped sweet onions (about 6 onions)
- 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup minced garlic (8 cloves)
- 4 medium red bell peppers (cored, seeded and roughly chopped)
- 4 medium yellow bell peppers (cored, seeded and roughly chopped)
- 2 teaspoons chili powder
- 2 teaspoons ground cumin
- ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (more or less, to taste)
- ½ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper (more or less, to taste)
- 4 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more for chicken
- Four 28-ounce cans whole peeled plum tomatoes in puree, undrained
- ½ cup minced fresh basil leaves
- 6 cups shredded cooked chicken breasts
- freshly ground black pepper
- onions, corn chips, grated cheese, sour cream (suggested toppings)
Instructions
- In a large pot, cook the onions in oil over medium-low heat for 10 to 15 minutes, until translucent. Add the garlic and cook for 1 more minute. Add the bell peppers, chili powder, cumin, red pepper flakes, cayenne and salt. Cook for 1 minute. Crush the tomatoes by hand or in batches in a food processor fitted with a steel blade (pulse 6 to 8 times.) Add to the pot with the basil. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Add the cooked chicken to the chili and simmer, uncovered, for another 20 minutes.
- Serve with the toppings, or refrigerate and reheat gently before serving.
Notes
- If preparing this recipe as DAIRY FREE, don't serve with sour cream or cheese. If preparing this recipe as GLUTEN FREE, choose tortilla chips that are known to be GF.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I saw Ina fix this on her show once , after making it once I was hooked. Every time I make this for someone they are crazy for it also. One of my favorites for sure. It also freezes well so don’t worry about too much for one meal. My friends make a big batch freeze and take it to the deer lease
How much is a serving? I want to make it this week ? Thanks!
It’s hard to say because the recipe makes a lot. If you’re counting servings, you’ll just need to divide it up to figure out…
The recipe is definitely a keeper! Thank you!
Loved this recipe, it tasted quite like a jalfrezi before the cheese, sour cream and tortillas were added. Really tasty and surprisingly the kids ate it even though it was pretty spicy. I halved it the recipe and still have some left over for tomorrow
My family loved this dish. I did tweek some of the amounts of the spices by adding more, but I tend to do that with any recipe. I also used rotel tomatoes instead of the plum since thats what I had on hand and I will continue to use the rotel again. I also baked my chicken longer, so the meat was very tender. My son just asked the other day when I would make this recipe again because he loved it…so I have the chicken breasts in the oven right now and it will be dinner tonite. We topped ours with shredded cheddar and sour cream with tortilla chips and corn bread on the side. Excellent recipe.
WOW!!! Made so much I had to take a bunch to friends, really an enormous recipe, but we loved it!