Turn Chili Into An Extra-Hearty Meal With One Italian Addition

Chili is a hearty meal on its own. It's often loaded with meat, such as ground beef, chicken, or turkey, and there are so many ways to make the dish more filling, from beans to rice to even sweet potatoes. While you can keep it simple by serving it in a bowl with a little sour cream on top, you can also build a heartier, even more delicious meal by serving chili over tortellini or adding the Italian pasta directly to the dish.

Chili over rice or egg noodles is a similarly filling meal, but the tortellini adds an extra layer of flavor because the pasta is filled with something else (such as cheese, meat, veggies, or a combo of any of these). Some tortellini come fresh and are sold in the refrigerated section of the grocery store, while other tortellini can be purchased dried in the regular pasta aisle. The kind you use is up to you, but the tortellini filling should pair well with any flavors that are already in your chili. A five-cheese tortellini is a safe choice, for instance, as well as a tortellini with a creamy, mild filling, like spinach and ricotta. And if you're in a time crunch, you can even pair the tortellini with a store-bought canned chili to keep it simple.

There are two easy ways to pair tortellini and chili. Whether you're making a spicy slow cooker beef chili recipe or simmering a can on the stove, you can either serve the chili over the cooked tortellini, or you can combine the tortellini directly into the chili. The former method lets you decide what kind of tortellini to chili ratio you want; add less tortellini to your bowl for a more chili-forward dish, or vice versa.

If you're combining the chili and tortellini and cooking them together, know that dried tortellini takes longer to cook. When using this kind, it's best to cook it — or at least start the cooking process — in a pot of boiling water before adding it to the chili. You can either let it finish cooking as the chili simmers, or just add it in at the end if the chili is ready to serve. Fresh tortellini only needs a few minutes in boiling water, so you can add this right from the package into the simmering chili. Let it cook until tender (a taste test is best here). Both types work well, and the result is a hearty, filling dinner that you can meal prep for the week or serve to a crowd all at once.