quick, easy and surprisingly tasty 'chili'

had just a half hour to get dinner ready tonight, DH had an appointment..... and we felt like chili

here's what I did in my handy dandy cast iron fry pan/dutch oven

pound of ground beef

half a red onion, diced small
several fresh mushrooms, broken in smaller pieces

equivalent of one pepper (I used a quarter of each of green, orange, yellow and red pepper)
cut in half inch chunks

can of red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
can diced tomatoes
can beans in tomato sauce

put the beef on to scramble fry, stirring and breaking up big chunks (get onion, mushrooms and peppers ready)

when beef was 'just about' browned, scrape it over to one side of pan, dump in onion and mushrooms, stir/fry, (meanwhile, cut up tomatoes, open cans of beans)

once onion start to carmelize, stir all together to mix in beef. spoon out beef/onion/mushroom to larger pot, (reserving any fat in the fry pan) set pot of beef mixture over low heat

('cause I used very lean beef, added a bit of oil to pan) in same pan add peppers, saute until peppers are just thinking about being almost cooked (still crisp, but hot in temp)

Add the peppers to the pot, along with the canned tomatoes and beans, and cayenne, stir to blend

cover and heat on med until bubbly. stir occasionally

I liked this because the peppers were still crisp!

half hour, from walking in the door to spoonin' out the chili! YUM!