How To Make Kevin’s Famous Chili from The Office

Scranton’s very own Kevin Malone, er, Brian Baumgartner, actor/comedian from “The Office,” stopped by the MUNCHIES Test Kitchen to make a batch of his famous chili from his new cookbook “Seriously Good Chili Cookbook: 177 of the Best Recipes in the World.”
Brian’s chili, which is inspired by Kevin’s infamous scene from “The Office,” has everything you could want: savory ground beef, ancho chili powder, and a clever secret ingredient (hint: it’s beans from a can).
Brian shares not just his love for this one-pot crowd pleaser, but also what his character Kevin has done to bring joy to so many viewers and the gloriousness of physical comedy. You won’t want to miss this one!
Check out the recipe here: https://www.vice.com/en/article/akengp/seriously-good-chili-recipe

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Oh I can think of them after I see that Tina’s the mess like how to kind of clean it up before everyone got in there I did it in one take I mean I’m tremendously proud of that as amazing as they were and how well they had it all

Planned out I don’t think anybody had really factored in cleaning me it was everywhere and when I say everywhere I’m not going to get too personal but it was everywhere okay so I don’t know if we really would have been able to do it more than once um

Hi everybody it’s Brian Baumgartner here today we are making chili from drum roll please my new cookbook seriously good chili cookbook we have it’s on the cover 177 of the best chili recipes in the world but today we’re gonna make the very best we’re gonna make mine of course to start

We’re gonna do some chopping now I’m gonna be honest about something chopping is not my forte we’re gonna chop a bell pepper that’s green then we’re going to chop an onion and we’re gonna chop a couple of cloves of garlic so in the cookbook we’ve got 177 recipes they’re

Not all mine I don’t have 177 of my own we went to celebrity chefs Chef chefs some fan submitted recipes that got into the book most importantly we went to the world championship chili cook-off I did last year there are world champion recipes in The cookbook

Well I say nobody ever makes a chili for themselves you don’t make a pot of chili with several pounds of meat for yourself so I view it as communal something you do with friends with family for me I started actually when I was cooking for

A group thought oh I’m gonna try to make chili I’ve never made it before this is several years after the the scene on the show The Office I made it and I posted the picture online people went nuts people went crazy that I was making chilia the biggest similarity between my

Recipe and Kevin’s recipe which I have I have tried multiple ways but the trick truly is to undercook the onion I’m looking for a transmission onion which has that real onion flavor caramelizing the onions cooking it too long it really does change the flavor I’m looking for a combination of flavors that blends

Together in a very nice way there we go there’s the garlic and there’s the onions we’re going to turn it up yeah so if you don’t know how I became the chili guy and why I’m making chili today there’s a scene in the office where

Kevin brings in to work a pot of his famous chili which he says is probably the thing that he does best carries it up the stairs the elevator is broken and then of course spills it all over the floor I mean is it a tremendous achievement in brilliant physical comedy

Yes yes it is but I think that the scene embodies what the office was trying to say overall in the 10 years nine Seasons that the show was on it was really about a celebration of ordinary people doing ordinary things and trying their best in very small ways to have small victories

And I think even though Kevin doesn’t succeed this year and nobody to try his chili It’s really about it’s about the trying all right I don’t want to overcook these I think those appear to be translucent to me right today we’re using beef I also feel like it’s just as

Good with turkey but there’s nothing wrong with beef so we’re going to Brown this up we’re gonna get it just beginning to Brown and then another thing that I am very adamant about is tomato paste I want to add the tomato paste in while the meat is Browning and

I feel like that again that really helps tie in all of the flavors there we go that’s a cooking all right now I’m going to turn this down to kind of a simmer I think this meat looks really Brown looks deliciously gorgeous am I right it looks

Really good are you catching that and now we’re going to kind of add the rest of our stuffs we’re going to add some finely diced tomato tomato sauce oregano ancho chili powder and some chili powder and some salt and some sugar and some black powder it’s black pepper powder

Combine it all up in there and again I did turn it down we’re going to try to simmer this and then we’re going to let it sit and now if I were at home I’d probably let it go a couple three hours ish and continue to reduce down bubbling

Slightly again and then we may cover it let it go from there you know the great thing about doing shows like this is that you know you just continue to watch and suddenly things are cleaned up it’s amazing how that works now we have been cooking this

For quite a while I wanted to talk to you a little bit about my good friend and yours cayenne pepper now there’s a big discussion in the world of Chile about how spicy you want it how much of a kick is it a five alarm chili I like a

Little bite I’m not a big Spice guy I added a little bit during the break I’m not going to lie to you I’m going to add a little bit more to that and we’re gonna add the beans I use always Bush’s chili beans now why because it has some

Chili sauce on it so most beans you drain get the water all out of there rinse drain and have it be done there is some of their chili sauce that is in the beans so you open the can and put it all in that sauce is good you can get mild

Or you can get spicy again if you want to add some spice that way but but don’t add the beans until about 20 minutes before you want to serve because we don’t want them to get too mushy so I’ve got here some extra chili powder some extra ancho chili powder and some

Cayenne but this point things are going to get fun I’m gonna start uh tasting a little bit and I can always add a little spice as this continues to go I have what was referred to as a tasting spoon I don’t have tastings food specifically in my kitchen at home but potato potato

Oh it’s really good oh it’s really good oh it’s really good um I think we’re pretty good on the spices there actually I can taste the cayenne pepper a little bit don’t mess with hot sauce come on don’t mess with hot sauce just add some spice okay take

It from me cayenne pepper pure simple delicious definitely a little spicy all right I’ve tasted it again I think we’re ready here now to serve this up delicious looking and now it’s about the toppings always good we’ve got some onions here we’ve got some jalapenos we’ve got some sour

Cream and scallions and cheddar cheese here I like to keep it a little simple me personally just a little bit of cheese just a little bit of scallions we talk about different regions in the book Cincinnati chili they like their spaghetti with the chili on top beans

Versus no beans this is just dad gum delicious a little cheese a little scallion as expected it’s incredible for the recipe click the link below or just get the book I promise there’s some great stories I know it’s hard to describe that experience though of like when you’re working on a television show or a movie and that there’s just a person touching you at all times which sounds pleasant like by the end of the day I think you get tired of like the mic and the this

And the clothes and the hair and makeup but imagine being a Kardashian man yeah imagine being a Kardashian