Saving Scorched Chili
With all the emails I receive asking various cooking questions, I thought it would be fun to post some of the responses in a new section to my web site called Ask A Chef. Many times when I get a question from you, I send it to one of my chef friends for their advice. Between their answer and my own thoughts on a subject, I respond. This way you get advise from a professional chef with a home cooks point of view.
Becky wrote and asked, “Is there anyway to save scorched food, not totally scorched but just a little, enough to taste. I made a great pot of chili, left the room to answer the phone and came back to scorched food. Any tips would be great.”
After conferring with Chef Ricco, here’s how I responded:
First of all, don’t go back and stir the bottom of the pan and try to scrape all the burnt stuff off. Instead, get another pan; transfer all the non-burnt chili into the pan being careful to leave any burnt chili. Now you can continue cooking but try not to take your “eye off the ball”.
If you scraped the bottom of the pan in an attempt to rescue the original batch, you might as well throw it all out and start over since there is no way you are going to get rid of the burnt flavor.
Preventions
A few things you can do to prevent this from happening are being sure you are using a quality pot with heavy bottom. Cheaper pots typically have hot spots and don’t distribute the heat as well resulting in burning food. A well made soup pot or stock pot will have excellent distribution of heat and a bottom heavy enough to prevent “some” burning.
You can also try lowering the heat. This way you don’t have to watch as careful, but you still want to be paying attention. If you can’t adjust the heat on your stove low enough, try purchasing a stovetop heat diffuser. This simple gadget can help modify the strength of the heat and prevent scorching foods.
And in Becky’s case, she may consider having a phone installed in the kitchen but I’m not so sure that’s a good idea if it distracts her while she is cooking.
on February 9th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
I found a little trick in a curry recipe book that said if your food sticks to the bottom of the pan to take it off the heat for a few minutes and then try stiring it and i’ve found that it comes off the bottom quite easily altough left for to long and all you get is a horrible burnt taste. I’d only reccomend this if you’ve got the heat to high or it had been left for a short while.
on March 2nd, 2007 at 1:53 pm
I PUT SOME SMOKE FLAVORING, JUST A LITTLE. IT HELPS WITH THE BURNT FLAVOR IF NOT TOO BURNT.
on September 15th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
I have a slightly burnt taste to one of my mega pots of chili (one burner on my ceramic top stove heats in spurts even on the lowest setting)…I managed to scrape the bottom before I realized what had happened. Any thoughts? I had been cooking a vegetarian chili, wondering now if I add more ingredients and meat if I can save it somewhat. (Planning to serve vegetarian and meat chili tomorrow, was going to add onions and meat to one of the two pots today)…It’s hard to tell if a little bit of burn is too much burn at this point. Why do some recipes call for adding vinegar?
on December 9th, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Adding vinegar helps with the gas that all the beans will cause. Sounds weird, I know, but it works.
on February 15th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Great tips. I usually just eat the foods with the burnt taste or throw them away! I will be moving on now. Thanks
on February 25th, 2008 at 12:44 am
Hi,
Thanx for these tips! This is something I never thought of doing.
Cheers
Chef Johan
on February 27th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
There is no such thing as saving scorched chili! However, there is a simple way of doctoring it up. I am the infamous chili burner so, I always pick up an extra package of chili seasoning EVERY time that I plan on cooking chili. You can strain the chili and rinse with cool water. This will completely get rid of the burnt taste. Then you just put it back in the pan, add water and more chili seasoning. I also add a teaspoon of liquid smoke to help! This really really works!
on March 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
i saved a pot of chili that was sticking to the bottom of the casserole . I transfered it to my slow cooker and added a heaping tablespoon of peanut butter, yes peanut butter! And WOW the burnt smell and taste went away, couldn’t believe it!
on July 14th, 2008 at 11:07 am
Peanut butter really works, tried this last nite and even after stirring the burnt flavor into the chili, its now tolerable.
on September 14th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Great ideas for chili, but what about green beans? Back to back to back phone calls, and trying to catch the weather coming our way from Ike and I got home canned grean beans burnt! (And my daughter and family are invited to dinner!)
on October 2nd, 2008 at 3:07 pm
I accidently made my chili way too spicy - is there anyway to fix this? I thought I read somewhere that adding a potato can help when you’ve added too much spice?
on October 8th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
You guys and the Internet are incredible! Made a double batch of easy bean chili for a large group of friends and burned it on the new gas stove. Will try the peanut butter
on October 20th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
I was heartbroken when i burned a double batch of turkey-chili, but i tried the peanut butter and it worked really well!! i also added more chili powder, a couple squirts of ketchup and a little Frank’s hot sauce. you should have seen my daughter’s face when i told her about the peanut butter!! couldn’t taste it at all!! THANK YOU!!!
on November 22nd, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Mayonnaise and lemon pepper… I know sounds strange .. but the lemon in the lemon pepper and the mayo, combined with the creaminess of the mayo really counteracts the bitterness.
1tbsp. Mayo per 1 1/2 lbs. of chili
1/2 tsp lemon pepper
on November 22nd, 2008 at 1:51 pm
P.S. just make sure you sir in the mayo very rapidly or it will curdle.
on March 17th, 2009 at 9:16 am
I accidentially scorched the potatoe soup I was making for a soup supper. Any suggestions on how to get rid of the burnt taste.
on August 6th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
ok.. i am amazed. doing a fundraiser chili supper tomorrow and scorched the chili. googled scorched food. if peanut butter works you are geniuses…
on October 13th, 2009 at 5:28 am
Be careful of the peanut butter. There are people who have allergic reactions to anything peanut. If you use that technique you should inform your guest. Some people can not even be in the same room with anything peanut related.
on November 6th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
My husband is allergic to peanut butter so I tried sunflower butter (which is similar to peanut butter). It worked!! I was very skeptic, but I didn’t want to throw away a huge pot of vegetarian chili. We could not believe we saved it.
on November 13th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
My chili is too spicy.. any way I can fix it?
on November 28th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Kat - if you still have the spicy chili - peel and slice a RAW potato, in big chunks and add that to the chili while heating it up. The raw potato will absorb a lot of the spice. Take the potato chunks out before serving. This actually blends the spice nicely too!
on November 28th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
The Raw Potato may also help get rid of the scorched taste in Chili.
on December 13th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Peanut butter really works! I tried it on a pot of burned chili and it took most of the burned taste away. Add a few tablespoons to a large pot or a teaspoon per bowl.
on December 29th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
It was my time to shine for Sunday Football. I went all out for snacks, zoom zooms and wham whams. I had over $50.00 worth of chili cooking in a huge stock pot, in the excitement of the first game, it happened. The chili wasn’t stirred in time and it was scorched. My wife jumped onto Ask.com and found this blog which suggested to add a heaping tablespoon of peanut butter. I was doubtful and didn’t serve the chili. But today I refused to let my funds go to waste and reluctantly tried the remedy. To my surprise and great delight, IT WORKED! ! Thanks for saving my chili and my money. My wife, son and I had a great Tuesday night chili party!! The scorched smell slightly lingered, but it didn’t taste burned to any of us. Again, thanks for updating this awesome blog with the helpful peanut butter remedy.
You are very welcome and thanks for telling us your story. - RG
on February 14th, 2010 at 6:47 pm
Well, I tried the peanut butter in my scorched chili and it worked! The tip saved a gallon of chili and 5#s of meat! Had to readjust the seasonings as the PB made the chili bland but that isn’t a problem.
Hi Natalie, thanks for sharing your experience. - RG
on February 17th, 2010 at 6:42 pm
I was making dinner for a friend and I burned a huge pot of chili. I carefully removed the portion which wasn’t burned. It tasted so, so, but left a bitter after taste. I decided to try the peanut butter—and was delighted to discover it worked very well!
Hi Peg, peanut butter to the rescue again. Thanks for sharing your results. - RG
on April 2nd, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Does anyone have any ideas to take the sweetness out of chili. I used different tomatoes this time I guess that was it, no clue.. Do you think the potato will work? Or will it take away the salt and spices as well?
Great question. It could be the tomatoes or possibly your onions or maybe tomato paste. I have read that dry mustard added a little at a time can help with sweetness. Also, you can try unsweetened cocoa powder which is not sweet. - RG
on April 2nd, 2010 at 6:12 pm
I do not have dry mustard, do you think regular mustard will work?
Hi Tawnie, not sure since I have never tried it but only read it may help. You may want to try taking a little portion of the chili and add a small amount of regular mustard and see if that works. If it does, you can try it with the whole batch. - RG