How not to do it.

[cactuswatcher]

It's a tribute to the qualities of chili that this litany of foul ups works out fine for them. Wish I could make them a batch correctly. They might be surprised. No offense to this English lady, but she's watched too many cooking shows without understanding what was going on. Martin and Kaeyi are a nice couple and this is not intended to make fun of them. But she should try to get a little more cooking experience before giving lessons.

Odd things.
Kaeyi does not understand that the oil in this recipe is to keep the onions (and garlic, see below) from sticking to the pan and that's it. They might be able to do with less oil and certainly don't need to wait till the oil is hot to put the onions in.

Kaeyi has obviously seen the cooking shows where you mix the spices with the oil first. Chili isn't that kind of dish. You have to cook fresh garlic a little before the meat goes in, but there is no reason for using fresh garlic in something you are going to simmer for a long time. Use garlic powder and you don't need to piddle around cooking it. Putting the fresh peppers in and reducing them to mush is something I would never do. Putting them in before the meat just makes it a harder and longer process to brown the meat. Best order: onions then meat then spices. Leave the red peppers to the end and the simmer step so they'll have some texture.

Kaeyi tells us she doesn't like the taste of tomatoes then puts in a big gob of tomato paste(!) which she has to water down with some sort of reconstituted stock thing. None of that is either necessary or advisable.

I have no idea whatsoever why Kaeyi cooked the meat and stock separate from the beans. Maybe just inexperience. Kidney beans are tough and so are black beans. You can cook the heck out of them and they will still remain firm.

It's true you can eat chili as soon as the whole mix is hot, so 20 minutes simmering isn't ridiculous. For my money, simmer the mixture a minimum of 45 minutes and for goodness sake leave the lid off. With all that extra water in it I'd simmer Kaeyi's at least an hour.

Kaeyi is in a huge hurry to get the leftovers frozen. Sadly there is probably not room in their fridge to put the whole pot in. But I wish they would dish out two extra servings and keep them in the fridge till the next evening. Chili is always better the second day.