Time for Chili

[ecowper]

Dug around in the freezer the other day. I found about 2.5 lbs of flat that I saved after cutting up a brisket for pastrami. And I found about 3 lbs of chuck roast. They’ve been dry brined for a couple hours, put some BBBR on them. Fired up the Hasty-Bake so I can smoke them. 40 lit briquettes, 80 unlit, plus a nice chunk of oak. Going to smoke the meat to about 165. Plus smoke an onion. Then use all that to make the chili.

First chili this fall.

[TheCountofQ]

Would love to see your fire box set up. The relation of lit coals placement to unlit. Hoe about beans? Are you a beanless chili kind of guy?

[ecowper]

Here’s my chili recipe. It’s not very precise. And you can add to it or take away from it as you please.

This will be doubled. I normally would do a single 3 lb chuck roast, but I have that brisket flat to use up.

3 lbs (give or take0 chuck roast
1 large onion
1/2 lb of bacon, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced/pressed
3 TBSP chili powder
1 TBSP cumin powder
1 can diced tomatoes
juice from 2-3 limes
1 ounce dark chocolate
1 cup decent red wine or a bottle of Shiner Bock
Beef stock

Smoke the chuck roast and onion
Cut the chuck into roughly 1” cubes. Remove the excessive fat
I use an enameled Dutch oven for this, but cast iron would be great too. Or stainless steel. Whatever
Cook the bacon until the fat renders and it’s a bit crunchy
Brown the chuck in the bacon fat. You may need to add some olive oil
Reserve the chuck meat
Roughly chop your onion and cook in the bacon fat/beef fat until wilted
add garlic, cook until aromatic, 2-3 minutes
add chili powder and cumin, cook for about 1 minute
add wine or beer and scrape browned bits of meat, etc off the bottom of the pot
add the meat, diced tomatoes, lime juice, chocolate and enough stock to raise the liquid to cover the meat.

Now simmer until the meat is tender. Add salt and pepper if you think it needs some. I like to throw in chopped up carrots and bell peppers about 10 minutes before serving. If it isn’t thick enough, crush up 10-15 tortilla chips and stir into the chili, then cook a bit longer.

If you like, serve over rice. Or plain. Have some good crusty bread on hand to eat with it. A big red wine, a Cabernet, or some Shiner Bock goes great with it.

Enjoy

[ecowper]

Everything is on the Hasty-Bake and cooking. Onion will be good in another 20 minutes, or so.

[Mr. Bones]

Brother, that sounds like some Epic chili!!!!
Hopin' to make my first seasonal batch in th' next day, or two! (Got maters an peppers, out da wazoo!!!!)

[Pirate Scott]

I am gonna try this for sure. Thanks for the Recipe.

[ecowper]

I love how stable the Hasty-Bake is .... FYI TheCountofQ .... my setup for smoking is like this. I light 40 briquettes in a chimney. I leave just enough room for them at the far end of my firebox. I put my wood in that space. Then I put 80 briquettes in a 3 high pile across the width of the firebox. I let the briquettes light in the chimney for 30 minutes, until I have flames, but they aren’t fully ashed over. I dump them in the empty space I left in the firebox, on top of my wood chunks. I leave the firebox all the way down .... well, about 1/2 inch up for airflow. I open my door vent and one of the two vents at the other end. Put the heat deflector in place and an aluminum pan filled with water on top of the heat deflector. This runs between 225 and 240 for 4-5 hours. Plenty long enough for ribs.
My too low grill temp is be because I had a piece of meat too close to the ambient probe. You can see once I moved the meat another inch away, my grill temp is running right at 240.

[JCGrill]

I'm looking forward to doing some myself very soon. I find for many chili is a very personal dish. But let me pass along an idea to try instead of chili powder. Use your favorite chili recipe, but...

4 ancho chiles
2 pasilla chiles
2 guajillo chiles
2-4 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce

Heat the dried chiles on a skillet over medium heat for a couple of minutes on each side. Remove from the heat, add to a bowl, and cover with hot water. Soak the chiles for about 30 minutes, until soft. When the chiles are soft cut them in half lengthwise, remove the seeds and veins, and add them to a blender together with the chipotle chiles and a bit of the soaking water. Use as much of the soaking water as needed to make a nice puree. Process in the blender until smooth.

If desired, the chile puree can be made a day ahead. When working with the chiles, gloves are recommended. Sub this puree for your recipe's call for chili powder. I find this is about the right amount for 3 quarts of chili.

I actually stole this idea from someone on the web years ago, and I can't find it anymore to give credit.

[ecowper]

Pulled the meat around 160’ish. Tons of smoke flavor on the brisket and chuck roast. Trimmed away the fat and chopped all the meat up into rough 1” cubes. Then followed my method above.

[Thunder77]

Still too hot here in Baltimore for chili. Almost hit 90 today! Ugh. Great looking batch of goodness there, though!

[ecowper]

Our tomatillos are ripe finally. Stacy promised me she is making Chile Verde next weekend!!!! I LOVE her Chile Verde almost as much as my Chili con Carne.

[Jetski]

I've been wanting to use some smoked chuck in my chili. Thanks for posting this! Now if it would just cool off enough here in MO to make a big ol' pot.

I also discovered the brilliancy of doing a puree with fresh peppers in place of chili powder last year. Love it.

[Mosca]

Next weekend is the chili weekend for me. Weather's going to break on Thursday, going from upper 80s to upper 60s.