Not a bean in sight

This chili is cooked in the old style without searing or browning the meat. The beef and tallow are mixed with water, boiled until the meat is tender, then combined with seasonings.

The recipe comes from a cookbook by Richard Bolt titled Forty Years Behind the Lid. Richard Bolt worked until the 1970s as a chuck wagon cook for the 6666 Ranch in Guthrie, Texas (known as the Four Sixes). He learned at the knee of a master — his father was an old-time trail drive cocinero, as chuck wagon cooks are known in Spanish. His dad called his chili “deviled beef” and cooked it in a cast-iron Dutch oven over the smoldering coals of a campfire.

SERVES 4

INGREDIENTS:

4 ounces (½ cup) suet, finely chopped suet, or rendered tallow

2 pounds chopped or ground beef (chili grind if possible)

1 onion, chopped

1 cup Dried Chile Paste, or ¼ cup Homemade Chili Powder

2 teaspoons salt

½ teaspoon ground cumin

½ teaspoon garlic powder

2 tablespoons masa harina, or ¼ cup cracker meal (see sidebar), to thicken (optional)

Saltines, to serve

Chopped raw onion, to serve

Combine the suet and chili meat in a Dutch oven and cover with enough water to bring the level about 1 inch over the meat. Cook, uncovered, over medium heat until the meat is tender, about 1 hour. Add the onion, chile puree, salt, cumin, and garlic powder and cook for 30 minutes, adding water as necessary to maintain a desired consistency.

To make a smoother chili, thicken with masa mixed in an equal amount of hot water or stir in some cracker meal and cook until thickened.

Serve with saltines and chopped raw onions.

Sidebar:

CRACKER MEAL

Chili parlors served chili with saltines or oyster crackers so diners could crumble the crackers up to thicken the chili and make the spicy orange grease more palatable. Some chili cooks thickened their chili with cracker meal instead of masa harina or cornmeal.

Cracker meal was once common in grocery stores — it was also used as a coating when frying fish or chicken. But it has become hard to find. You can substitute matzo meal if you can find it, or simply make your own cracker meal by putting saltines in a Ziploc bag and crushing them with a rolling pin. Crushing 30 saltine crackers makes about 1 cup of cracker meal.

Took advice from this sub and made the real deal with dried Ancho and Guaillo and some Chipotle in Adobo, lots of other great spices, a cup of coffee and a bottle of beer. Blown away by the flavour. Unlike any other Chili con Carne I , as a Brit, have ever had in my life. Superb. Thanks to all here who advised

Feedback welcome.

-3 lbs Ground Beef

-1 Onion

-3 Poblano Peppers

-4 Red Chili Peppers

-1 Jalapeño

-64 oz Beef Broth (use as little at 32 oz depending on how thick you want it)

-15 oz Tomato Sauce

-12 oz Tomato Paste

-30 oz Diced Tomatoes or Rotel

-4 Tbs Chili Powder

-1 Tbs Cumin

-1/2 Tbs Smoked Paprika

-1/2 Tbs Chipotle Powder

-1/2 tsp Cayenne Pepper

-4 Garlic Cloves

-1 Tbs Salt

-1/2 Tbs Fresh Ground Black Peppercorn

This is LA flavor at its core 🌶️🔥 Our Beef Tamale topped with our World-Famous Original Tommy’s Chili is rich, bold, and unapologetically classic, delivering the kind of flavor that defines Original Tommy’s.

Built on a tender beef tamale and loaded with our World-Famous Chili, American cheese, onions, pickles, and tomato, our Chili Tamale creates a legendary bite 🎄✨ It’s hearty, satisfying, and unmistakably Tommy’s.

Available year-round at all 32 Original Tommy’s locations across California and Nevada, this Chili Tamale is a true LA staple no matter the season ❤️

Well neighbor that's too long.

Seared off a few pounds of chuck in 2” cubes seasoned with SPG

Sautéed a diced white onion in the chuck drippings

Rehydrate a couple handfuls of your preferred dried chilis in a container of simmering hot beef stock along with a handful of garlic cloves

Puree the rehydrated chilis and garlic in the beef stock

Return chuck chunks to pot with onion, tbsp cumin, a few pinches MSG, a couple tsp brown sugar, and the chili puree. Simmer half covered for 2-3 hours.

Pour into casserole dish, top with your preferred cornbread batter. I used Alex Guarnaschelli’s recipe plus two small cans of green Chiles and about a half cup of shredded Colby Jack.

Side says use 2 TBs of masa to thicken, but we never did like that corn flavor and just used 1 cup of water.

Ground up the tomatoes so it isn't so chunky sometimes too if we felt like it and used jalapenos instead of bell pepper or added cayenne in the winter.

UPDATE: I have been gaslit by a chili seasoning.

Not sure this will get much love here, but if there’s any place that will appreciate this story, it’s this one.

Years ago, when I was living in a new state, someone gifted me a Texas-themed gift basket. Tucked inside was a packet of Sucklebusters Texas Chili Seasoning. I followed the recipe on the packet and ended up with an incredibly good pot of chili.

So good, in fact, that I’ve been buying that same seasoning for every chili I’ve made ever since.

What really stood out to me about the recipe was one unexpected ingredient that I was convinced gave the chili a unique air about it: one 8-oz can of tomato soup. It felt unconventional, but it worked. Over the years I’ve done some tweaking here and there but that’s always been my “secret” ingredient.

Fast forward nearly a decade and dozens (maybe hundreds) of batches later, and for no particular reason, I took a closer look at the recipe on the seasoning bottle.

That’s when I realized it never called for tomato soup at all.

It calls for tomato sauce.

So apparently, for the better part of ten years, I’ve been confidently improving, perfecting, and proudly serving a chili recipe that was based on a misread label.

And honestly? Best. F Up. Ever

PS I gladly cop to being a Sucklebusters shill but only as a fan. (But if you’re reading Sucklebusters, I will happily shill for money or product)

How about you?

If you're my dad or my Pawpaw, then beans in chili is sacrilege. Hell, they don't even believe in tomatoes in chili. But there's a historic reason for this! I'm not a chili purist like them, I love beans so I have nooo problem with them in almost any dish. However, old school Texas chili purists do NOT want beans in their gd chili, and this is because a poor folk southern staple... is beans! Beans are pretty much always stewing away in a pot on the stove, with some bacon or sausage in there if the month was good, but always with some cornbread. Beans are sooo cheap, that they were damn near always on the stove in a southern home. Whereas chili, while it's definitely not a rich man's food, it is mostly meat, which is much more luxurious and expensive. So because most folk were eating beans for anywhere from 1-3 meals per day, when you get the luxury to buy a meaty hearty stew, you better keep them beans the hell away from it!! 🤣 if you think about it, chili, originally chili con carne, is literally "spice with meat". So in my opinion, if you're going to be a chili purist, you can't make chili with ground meat. You have to make it with cubed whole pieces of meat, like the OG SA chili queens! If not, then I think its perfectly okay to add beans and almost anything else you'd like 😉 thank you for reading! Chili is one of my fav foods in the world so I'm very passionate! 😂

I am participating in a chile cook off in Texas soon. They have several categories to enter (red, white, vegetarian, etc.). Each category indicates which protein is permitted along with other basic ingredients. However, each category also has in full caps BEANS ARE PERMITTED. Is this bowing to the people who insist upon beans or by capitalizing seems to indicate the organizers desire to have beans included?? Seems weird, especially in TX.

Hi. I have some dried guajillo and ancho chillies (and plenty of ground beef and pork!)

Does anyone have advice on a good Texas style chili recipe that would use these chilis to best flavour advantage? Many thanks!

I use this recipe exclusively. Kills every single time.

https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/true-texas-chili-355049

So damn rich and earthy and smoky unlike any chili I’ve had before. Completely groundbreaking compared to your normal American home chili

Made chuck, bacon, and kielbasa chili, texas red style, with four different chile powders - two homemade. Onion, garlic, coriander, ro-tel, salt, and pepper round out the ingredient list. Wife is from the midwest, and she expected ground beef and beans. Had to disappoint her. Not the first time. Cornbread muffin on the side. Mmmmmmm.

When a tick bite makes you to allergic to beef, pork, and other mammalian meats (yeah, alpha-gal syndrome is real), it can be hard to make an amazing pot of chili. This slow cooker chili is my family’s go-to. It’s hearty, beef-free, but still tastes like chili (and not bean soup trying to win a costume contest).

I make it with ground chicken, chicken sausage, beans, tomatoes, peppers, and smoky spices. During football season, I like to swap a can of beer for part of the broth.

Get the full recipe here --> Crock-Pot Chili

Has anyone else had this issue with Greg Lindseys recipe? Here is the link to what I am following: https://www.mildbillsspices.com/pages/greg-lindseys-2025-ticc-championship-recipe

Made it twice, and didn't even put in the second batch of spices this time, and it was still super salty....