Turkey Chili Soup

This dish was created at the grocery store.  When walking into the store this past weekend, we were trying to figure out what we wanted to make for Sunday dinner…we wanted something healthful that would provide some leftovers to eat on busy weeknights.  We thought about a white chicken chili we make with chicken breasts, but decided ground turkey sounded more “chili-ish”.  Without a recipe in hand, we walked through the store and selected ingredients we thought sounded good.  Thus, our Turkey Chili Soup was born.  And what a delicious result it was!  Take a look…

Ingredients

Olive oil

1 Pound ground turkey (I like using ground turkey breast)

1 Large onion, large diced

2 Jalapeno peppers, cleaned and small diced

1 Pobalano pepper, cleaned and large diced

1 Cup corn (I used frozen yellow)

3 (15 oz) cans beans (I used 2 cannellini and 1 pinto)

1 Tablespoon cumin

1 Tablespoon oregano

2 Teaspoons black pepper

½ Teaspoon crushed red pepper

6 ½ Cups chicken broth (I used unsalted stock)

Kosher salt to taste

1 Bunch Swiss chard, chopped

Sour cream, optional

Cheddar cheese, shredded, optional

Gastronome's Note:  We used a slow cooker, but you could easily make this on the stove.

Step 1

Begin, like I always do, by prepping the vegetables.  Large dice the onion.  When it comes to the peppers though, please be careful, especially the jalapenos!  I used gloves because of an incident I had the first time I chopped jalapenos.  It was for my sister’s graduation party and I was cleaning and dicing about 50 of them…gloveless.  My hands burned for days and the contacts I was wearing that day had to be tossed because they burned my eyes when I tried using them again!  So please, use caution!  Don’t be like me!  Remove as much of the veins and seeds as you like…that’s where the heat lives…so make it to your taste.  Small dice the jalapenos and large dice the poblano.

Step 2

Heat a medium sized saute pan over medium high heat.  Add some olive oil.  When it is hot, add the turkey and brown it.  It you have any excess fat when you are finished browning, just drain it off.

Step 3

Put the browned turkey, onion, peppers, corn, cumin, oregano, black pepper, red pepper and chicken broth in the slow cooker.  Drain and rinse the beans and then add them.  Add salt to taste.  Cover and turn to high heat for four hours.

Step 4

It should be bubbling and ever so fragrant by now.  Chop your Swiss chard and add it to the slow cooker.  It will begin wilting immediately when you stir it into the soup.  Let it heat through just a minute or two.  Then dish it up…doesn’t it look so healthful?!

Of course, I can’t stop there…I just had to reduce the low fat factor by adding some sour cream and shredded cheese…but oh how yummy it was!!!! J