Santa Fe Chicken Chili

Mid-May and the weather has warmed enough that the windows are open and the house breathes again after the sealed winter, after the months of recycled air and furnace heat, and the open windows are a form of optimism even when the optimism is complicated by the masks and the distance and the fact that the fresh air is carrying the same virus that the closed air was carrying but at least the fresh air smells like Connecticut in May, which smells like cut grass and lilac and the faint promise that this will not last forever.

At the hospital, the first wave is showing signs — not of ending, but of changing shape. The numbers have plateaued. The ICU is still full but no longer overfull. The cafeteria is still feeding a thousand people a day but the energy is different — less panic, more endurance, the shift from sprinting to marathon running. I have run a marathon before — not literally, I do not run, I cook, but professionally I have endured sustained crisis before, ice storms that knocked out power for days, the week after 9/11, the flu seasons that filled every bed. The body learns to sustain what the mind says it cannot, and my body has learned this lesson many times.

Rosa called on Tuesday. She is teaching remotely from her apartment in New Haven — twenty-five third-graders on a computer screen, learning fractions through a webcam, which Rosa describes with a mix of dark humor and genuine despair. The children are losing things — socialization, routine, the daily structure that school provides — and Rosa feels the loss the way teachers feel it, personally, as a failure even when the failure belongs to the virus and not to the teacher. Carlos is doing social work via phone, which is social work with the social removed, and he sounds tired in a way that is not physical.

I sent them a care package: frozen sofrito cubes, dried beans, rice, a container of flan, and a note that said, Rosa, you cannot save the world but you can feed yourself while you try. She called to say thank you and then she cried and I let her cry because sometimes the best thing a mother can do is hold the phone and let her daughter be sad.

The care package I sent Rosa had sofrito and dried beans because those are the flavors that mean home to her — the ones she grew up smelling on a Saturday morning before anything else was decided about the day. This Santa Fe Chicken Chili is what I told her to make with them: a pot of something warm and self-sustaining, built from pantry staples you can mail across a state, thick enough to last three days in the refrigerator and freeze into the next bad week if the bad week keeps coming. It is not a complicated recipe. It is not meant to be. It is meant to be the thing you make when you are tired and sad and you need to feel like someone is standing in the kitchen with you even when no one is.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 40 minutes | Total Time: 55 minutes | Servings: 6

Ingredients

1 1/2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken breasts or thighs, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 tablespoons sofrito (frozen cubes work perfectly — thaw two)
1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes with green chiles
1 can (15 oz) black beans, drained and rinsed
1 can (15 oz) pinto beans, drained and rinsed
2 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 cup frozen or canned corn, drained
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
Salt and black pepper to taste
Juice of 1 lime
Optional toppings: sour cream, shredded cheddar, sliced scallions, cilantro, tortilla chips

Instructions

Sauté the base. Heat olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed pot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion and bell peppers and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 6–8 minutes. Add the garlic and cook 1 minute more until fragrant.
Build the flavor. Stir in the sofrito and cook for 2 minutes, letting it bloom into the oil. Add the cumin, chili powder, smoked paprika, and oregano, stirring to coat the vegetables in the spices.
Brown the chicken. Add the chicken pieces to the pot and stir to combine with the sofrito-spice mixture. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is lightly browned on the outside, about 5 minutes.
Add liquids and beans. Pour in the diced tomatoes, chicken broth, black beans, pinto beans, and corn. Stir everything together, scraping any browned bits from the bottom of the pot. Bring to a boil.
Simmer until thick. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover partially, and simmer for 25–30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is cooked through and the chili has thickened to your liking.
Finish and season. Squeeze in the lime juice and season with salt and black pepper to taste. If the chili is thicker than you prefer, add a splash of broth. Serve hot with your choice of toppings, or let it cool completely before storing.

Nutrition (per serving)

Santa Fe Chicken Chili — The Recipe I Pack When I Cannot Be There