Ina Garten's COZY Chicken Chili Recipe 🥘 Barefoot Contessa | Food Network

Ina Garten’s chicken chili demonstrates a smart division of labour in the kitchen: roasting bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts separately to preserve moisture, while building a robust aromatic base in the pot. By roasting the chicken on the bone, the meat retains its natural juices and structure, preventing the dry, stringy texture that often plagues breast meat in long-simmered stews.\n\n## Building the Aromatic Base\nThe recipe relies on a foundation of sweat-softened yellow onions, garlic, and a mix of red and yellow bell peppers. Sweating the onions slowly over medium-low heat for up to 15 minutes releases their natural sweetness, providing a counterpoint to the heat. Warming spices—chili powder, cumin, cayenne, and dried red pepper flakes—are toasted briefly with the vegetables. This brief dry-toasting step is crucial; it activates the oil-soluble flavour compounds in the spices before the wet ingredients are introduced.\n\nRather than using smooth tomato passata or pre-crushed canned tomatoes, whole peeled plum tomatoes are crushed by hand or pulsed briefly in a food processor. This approach yields a rustic, varied texture that clings well to the spoon. Simmering this tomato and fresh basil base uncovered for 30 minutes allows the excess water to evaporate, thickening the sauce and concentrating the natural sugars.\n\n## Integrating the Roasted Protein\nWhile the sauce simmers, the chicken breasts are rubbed with olive oil, seasoned, and roasted at 350°F (approx. 175°C) for 35 to 40 minutes. Keeping the skin on during roasting shields the meat from the dry oven heat. Once cool enough to handle, the meat is stripped from the bone and cut into clean 3/4-inch chunks.\n\nThe diced chicken is folded into the simmering tomato base for a final 20 minutes of cooking. This duration is perfectly balanced: it is long enough for the meat to absorb the ambient spices of the chili, but short enough that the chicken chunks do not shred or dry out. For prep-ahead service, the entire dish benefits from overnight refrigeration, as the flavours meld and deepen before reheating.