I was given this recipe many years ago while visiting El Paso and have been working to perfect it into the best Texas Chili you will ever eat. True Texas Chili is never made with beans, but you can add beans if needed. If adding beans, use canned beans and wash them well before adding them to the pot during the last thirty minutes or so of cooking time. If I were to add beans to this chili, I would wash four, fourteen to fifteen ounces of beans and add them to the chili in the last thirty minutes or so of the cooking time.

This is a very rich chili and makes a chili that can be enjoyed with cornbread or you can put this chili on hamburgers or hot dogs. It also goes great with homemade chili cheese fries.

The first chili was probably made around 1800 or a little later somewhere on a Texas cattle drive. Chili was first made to use the toughest cuts of beef and then before you knew it, chili spread across the United States and then the world.

In this chili recipe we are going to use dried chilies, chili powder and cumin for a delicious combination of flavors that you will not soon forget. You want to take your dried chiles and remove the stems since you don’t want them in your chili. Wear plastic kitchen gloves and crumble the chiles once you have removed the stems.

West Texas Chili Ingredients

1. 10 small dried chilies, stemmed and crumbled.

2. Two pounds of brisket, cut into one-inch cubes.

3. A pound of ground beef.

4. A pound of ground pork.

5. Two tablespoons of minced fresh garlic.

6. Half a cup of chili powder.

7. A quarter cup of ground cumin.

8. A tablespoon of ground sea salt.

9. A tablespoon of ground black pepper.

10. Two twenty-eight ounce cans of diced tomatoes.

11. Two six-ounce cans of tomato paste.

12. One large diced red sweet onion.

13. A teaspoon of dried oregano.

14. Six cups of apple juice.

You will want to start by browning all the meat, onions and garlic until the meat is very brown. Don’t let your meat or vegetables burn. Start with the meat in a little vegetable oil and make it almost brown before adding the onions and garlic. Once the onions and garlic are done, drain the meat well, then dump everything into the skillet in a large pot.

Add the rest of your ingredients and begin heating over medium heat. You want to cook the chili over low heat without letting it boil. Stir the pot of chili frequently making sure to stir from the bottom of the pot so the chili doesn’t have a chance to stick.

You want to cook this chili for three to four hours on medium heat and you want it to cook down and thicken up a bit. This is one of the most important steps when making chili. Chili especially good like this West Texas Chili. If you are adding the beans, add them in the last thirty minutes of cooking time.

This chili is very good served in a bowl on a square of homemade cornbread. Click on that link and you will find a delicious cornbread recipe.