The World’s Best Chili Recipe

This chili recipe took me about six tries to get right, and I won’t be changing it again! (probably) Big chunks of beef short rib simmer for three hours with crispy chorizo and a dark beer, plus half a cup of coffee (yep, coffee!). It comes out thick and smoky and SO rich. Then a cold spoonful of lime crema melts into the top, with crumbled cotija right behind it. The last time I made it, I got asked for the recipe before anybody finished their first bowl! I call it the world’s best chili, and I’m sticking with that.

Do not forget to check out my Chefs Tips and Wine Pairings sections below!

Chili: A little history

Chili con carne got famous on the plazas of San Antonio. By the 1860s, the chili queens were setting up lantern-lit tables on the plazas at dusk and serving chili, tamales, and enchiladas until dawn. Bankers and lawyers sat right next to porters and gamblers! Stephen Crane visited in 1895 and described the food as “pounded fire-brick from Hades,” which I’m choosing to read as a compliment. The stands got moved around for years, sometimes over sanitation complaints and sometimes for new construction, until they finally closed in the early 1940s.

Meanwhile, about thirty miles up the road in New Braunfels, a German immigrant named William Gebhardt was running a little cafe in the back of a saloon. Chili was his best seller, but chiles were seasonal, so he started importing dried anchos and grinding them with cumin, oregano, and black pepper in an old hammer mill. By the mid-1890s he was bottling it. He called it Tampico Dust at first (great name) before renaming it Gebhardt’s Eagle Chili Powder. He helped turn chili powder into an everyday pantry staple.

Then came the cook-offs. In 1966 Frank X. Tolbert wrote a book called A Bowl of Red, and the next year he and his friends set up a chili duel in Terlingua, a near ghost town out in West Texas. Texas newspaperman Wick Fowler took on H. Allen Smith, a New York writer who’d published a magazine piece called “Nobody Knows More About Chili Than I Do.” The judges called it a tie. People have been arguing about chili ever since, and in 1977 Texas made it the official state dish.

Traditional Texas red has no beans at all. Mine has kidney beans, short ribs, and coffee, so I’d probably get laughed right out of Terlingua. But I’m happy to argue my case, from those lantern-lit plazas right on down to my stove.

What Makes This Chili Recipe Different

I make this chili recipe like a braise. The beef is short rib, cut into big chunks, and it cooks for three hours until a spoon goes right through it. I tried it with ground beef first. It was fine… just fine!

A teaspoon of anchovy paste melts into the onions in about thirty seconds and makes the beef taste beefier (yes, anchovy!). The dark beer, coffee, and cocoa are all a little bitter, and that’s where the roasty flavor of a really good bowl of red comes from.

At the very end, lime juice and red wine vinegar go in, and the lime crema on top is cool and creamy against all that smoke. The last bite tastes every bit as good as the first!

It’s a Sunday project, and it’s the pot I look forward to all fall.

How to Make Homemade Chili

Step 1: Brown the Meat and Start the Base

1. Crisp the Chorizo: Brown it in a Dutch oven, scoop it out, and pour off the fat.
2. Sear the Short Ribs: Season them and sear in batches until browned all over.
3. Start the Base: Soften the onions and peppers, then stir in the garlic and anchovy paste.

Step 2: Add the Liquids and Simmer

1. Deglaze: Pour in the wine and beer and scrape up the brown bits.
2. Add the Rest: Stir in the tomatoes, broth, coffee, and spices.
3. Simmer Uncovered: Add the meat back and simmer 2½ to 3 hours, with the beans going in after 2.

Step 3: Finish and Serve

1. Make the Lime Crema: Whisk the sour cream with lime and chill it.
2. Finish the Pot: Stir in the butter, then taste and adjust the salt and lime.
3. Serve: Top each bowl with lime crema, cotija, and cilantro.

Make-Ahead & Storage for Chili

• Make it ahead on purpose. Overnight in the fridge, the spices settle in and the chili thickens up. I almost always cook it the day before company comes!
• Cool it fast. A big pot of chili holds heat for hours, so split it into a few shallow containers and get it into the fridge within 2 hours. It’s good for as much as 4 days in there. I left a full Dutch oven on the stove overnight once… every bit of it went in the trash. Completely awful!
• Reheat it low. It thickens a lot as it sits, so add a splash of broth and warm it over low heat, stirring often so the bottom doesn’t scorch. Get it steaming hot all the way through, 165°F if you’re checking.
• Freeze it flat. Chili freezes really well. Ladle it into freezer bags and lay them flat, or use quart containers with an inch of room at the top. It’s good for as much as 3 months, and it thaws overnight in the fridge. The beans come out a little softer, which I don’t mind one bit.
• The Garnish Rule. The lime crema, cotija, and cilantro stay out of the pot. The crema is good for as much as 3 days in its own jar, and the cheese and cilantro go on right before you serve it!
• Meal Prep Tip. I keep a couple of deli quarts of this in the freezer pretty much all winter. Pull one out in the morning, and it’s thawed by dinner!

Chili Recipe Upgrades and Variations

I change this one up depending on the night and who’s eating!!

• Slow Cooker Chili: Brown the chorizo, sear the short ribs, and soften the onions on the stove first, then scrape the pot into your slow cooker with the liquids. Low for 8 hours, beans in for the last hour.
• Ground Beef Chili: Swap the short ribs for 2 pounds of 80/20 ground beef, browned in batches. It only needs about an hour and a half, which makes it my Tuesday version.
• Texas Red: Leave out the beans and add another pound of short rib. The folks in Terlingua would approve… I’d still sneak a few beans into mine.
• Dried Chiles: Toast two dried anchos and a guajillo in a dry pan for about 30 seconds a side, soak them in hot water for 20 minutes, and blend them into the beef broth. It turns the chili a deep brick red.
• More Heat: Two chipotles in adobo, chopped. Or jalapeños, half in with the onions and half at the very end. The early ones mellow out and the late ones stay sharp and green.
• Bacon Chili: Cook 4 slices of chopped bacon first and crisp the chorizo in the bacon fat. Smoky on smoky!
• Whiskey Chili: A splash of bourbon goes in with the beer.
• A Toppings Bar: For a crowd, I set out pickled red onions, sliced avocado, crushed tortilla chips, and fried shallots next to the crema and cotija, and let everybody make their own bowl.

Chef’s Tips for Chili

• Big Chunks: I cut the short ribs into pieces about the size of a golf ball. They shrink a lot over three hours, and little ones end up as shreds.
• Dry Before Searing: I pat them dry with paper towels and let them sit out for a few minutes. Wet meat just steams, and you lose that brown crust.
• Toast the Spices: Right before the beer goes in, I stir the cumin, paprika, and coriander into the onions for about a minute. The smell changes from dusty to nutty almost right away!
• Cook the Tomato Paste: Give it two or three minutes in the pot, until it darkens a shade and starts sticking to the bottom.
• Pick a Malty Beer: Porter or stout. I tried an IPA once, and after three hours the hops went bitter and harsh… never again.
• Brew the Coffee Strong: Leftover morning coffee works great. Weak coffee just disappears in there.
• Skim Before Serving: Even after draining the chorizo, a little orange fat collects on top. I drag a big spoon across the surface and it comes right off.

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Flavor Adjustment Guide for Chili

Chili is forgiving. Pretty much anything wrong with a pot can be fixed before you ladle it out.

• Flat or Bland: It’s almost always salt. Add it a pinch at a time and taste after each one. If it still tastes flat after that, squeeze in some lime… that’s usually the missing piece.
• Too Sweet: The brown sugar got away from you, or the tomatoes were sweeter than usual. Red wine vinegar, a teaspoon at a time.
• Too Spicy: Chiles vary a LOT. I once bought two chili peppers that turned out to be about three times hotter than the last batch, and my eyes watered the entire time I ate. More crema on top helps, or stir in another can of beans to stretch it out.
• Not Spicy Enough: Chipotle in adobo, one spoonful at a time. Done!
• Too Thin: Take the lid off and keep simmering. If you’re in a hurry, mash a cup of the beans against the side of the pot and stir them back in.
• Too Thick: A splash of broth. Or beer, if there’s any left in the can (there usually isn’t).
• Greasy: I skipped draining the chorizo once because I was in a rush, and the top of the pot looked like an oil slick! Lay a paper towel flat on the surface for a second and lift it off, and it pulls up a surprising amount of that orange fat.
• Bitter: Too much coffee, too much cocoa, or a hoppy beer. A teaspoon of brown sugar and a little butter will round it off.
• Meat Still Tough: It needs more time. Short ribs go from chewy to tender pretty suddenly, usually somewhere around hour three, so keep going and check every 15 minutes.

Key Ingredients for Chili

• Beef Short Ribs: Juicy. Melt-in-your-mouth. These are just criminally tender cuts that add depth to the chili. Well, as long as you commit to the slow cooking process, which breaks them down into the delicious, silky bites we know and love.
• Mexican Chorizo: Chorizo has tons of smoky spice in it. That gives it a dual purpose for our World’s Best Chili. But look out! Be sure to drain the excess fat.
• Dark Beer: A porter or stout will lend roasted malt flavors, think decadent thoughts of coffee, chocolate, and caramel.
• Brewed Coffee: Speaking of coffee, adding joe directly gives you a subtle bitterness that sits right next to all that sweet tomato and brown sugar.
• Fire-Roasted Tomatoes: The slight char means smokiness and bitterness. But the heat also develops the sugars in the tomatoes, which turns up the sweetness. All of that, plus the sharpness of the acid in tomatoes.
• Chili Peppers: Anaheim and chili peppers are obviously here for the heat. Adjust according to taste.
• Cocoa Powder: Secret ingredient alert. Cocoa powder deepens the dish, giving it a slight mole-style richness. But don’t worry, we won’t add in so much that it tastes like chocolate.
• Smoked Paprika: Adds an extra layer of smokiness.
• Cinnamon & Coriander: Warm spices that make the pot smell amazing while also filling out the flavor profile.
• Lime Juice & Red Wine Vinegar: A splash of acidity right at the end brightens it all up. (But you already knew that because you read our Guide to Mastering Flavor, right?)
• Lime Crema: A refreshing combo of sour cream, lime zest, and lime juice. This garnish does so much at once, adding flavor, making it creamier, and cooling down the chili so it’s ready to eat.
• Cotija or Feta Cheese: One of the great moments of eating chili is dropping in crumbly cheese.

Wine Pairings for Chili

• Zinfandel (California, USA)
  Why it Works: I reach for Zinfandel first. It’s big and jammy, and that touch of sweetness cools the heat down a little.
  Tasting Notes: Black raspberry, dried fig, baking spice, and a hint of tobacco.
  Suggested Label: Ridge Vineyards “Three Valleys” Zinfandel (Sonoma)
• Syrah/Shiraz (Northern Rhône, France or Barossa Valley, Australia)
  Why it Works: Syrah has a peppery, almost bacon-y thing going on all by itself, and next to short ribs and chorizo it tastes like it belongs in the pot.
  Tasting Notes: Blackberry, charcuterie, cracked pepper, and plum.
  Suggested Label: Penfolds Bin 28 Shiraz (Australia)
• Tempranillo (Rioja Reserva, Spain)
  Why it Works: Earthy and a little leathery, with enough acid to keep up with the lime and vinegar. Great with leftovers too, when the chili’s even thicker.
  Tasting Notes: Dried cherry, tobacco leaf, vanilla, and leather.
  Suggested Label: La Rioja Alta Viña Alberdi Reserva (Rioja)
• Malbec (Mendoza, Argentina)
  Why it Works: Plush and dark, and soft on the tannins. There’s cocoa in the wine and cocoa in the pot, and I like that a lot.
  Tasting Notes: Black plum, cocoa, violets, and a touch of smoke.
  Suggested Label: Catena Malbec (Mendoza)
• Gewürztraminer (Alsace, France)
  Why it Works: The white wine pick, for anybody who thinks red is too heavy with chili. A little sweet, very floral, and served cold, it calms the spice down fast.
  Tasting Notes: Lychee, rose petal, ginger, and honeysuckle.
  Suggested Label: Trimbach Gewürztraminer (Alsace)

Faq’s

Equipment Needed for Chili

• Dutch Oven or Large Heavy-Bottomed Pot: For browning the meat and the three-hour simmer. A heavy pot holds steady heat, so the bottom doesn’t scorch.
• Wooden Spoon or Spatula: For stirring and scraping up the brown bits after the beer goes in.
• Slotted Spoon: For scooping the chorizo out before you drain the fat.
• Sharp Knife: For chopping the onions, peppers, and garlic, and for cutting the short ribs into big chunks.
• Cutting Board: For prepping vegetables, herbs, and meat. I use a separate one for the raw short ribs.
• Measuring Spoons and Cups: For the spices, liquids, and seasonings, especially the cumin and cocoa, where a little goes a long way.
• Tongs: For moving the short ribs in and out of the pot while you sear in batches.
• Ladle: For serving. A deep one makes it easier to get the meat and beans from the bottom of the pot.
• Mixing Bowl: For whisking up the lime crema and setting out any extra toppings.
• Microplane or Zester: For grating the lime zest into the crema, green part only.
• Instant-Read Thermometer: For reheating leftovers to 165°F. Mine lives in the drawer right next to the stove.
• Serving Bowls: For serving. Wide, shallow ones leave room for a big spoonful of crema on top!

Related Recipes You’ll Love:

If there’s a pot of this chili on your stove, here’s what I’d put next to it:

The Best Cheddar Cheese Biscuits: My answer to “cornbread or biscuits?” Biscuits, every time, split open and dunked.
Buffalo Chicken Dip Recipe: For game day, when the chili is the main event and you still need something to eat while it simmers.
The BEST Homemade Baked White Wine Mac and Cheese: Spoon leftover chili over a bowl of this. Chili mac, the grown-up way!
Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup Recipe (The BEST): The other pot I keep going all winter long.
Deep & Creamy Beef Stroganoff: Another slow, beefy Sunday dinner, with mushrooms and sour cream in place of beer and chiles.