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Who doesn’t love chili? And what hunter doesn’t love venison chili? This is my version of this classic dish. Chili has endless variations: Beans or no beans? Ground meat or chunks? Or no meat at all? Tomato products or no tomato products? Add coffee? Chocolate? Cinnamon?
In fact, so far as I can tell, the only things that really must be in chili to make it chili are red peppers of some sort, cumin, and onions.
My version hinges on ground venison, but I’ve made it with all kinds of meats, even ground turkey. You can use any meat here. If you are a vegetarian, use lots of different dried mushrooms instead of meat.
What makes my chili unique is the huge amount of dried chiles I use. I will typically use 12 to 16 dried chiles of all sorts, reconstituted and then pureed with a cup of weak coffee to make the backbone of the dish. My advice is to use at least 4 kinds of chiles, and not all of them should be super hot. I like a mix of ancho, chipotle, guajillo, chile negro, chile mulato, cascabel, New Mexican and pasilla chiles. As you get to know these chiles — some are smoky, some hot, some sweet — you can adjust the mix to your taste.
[recipe_name]Venison Chili[/recipe_name]
[summary]This is my version of this classic dish. It does involve several items you don’t normally see in chili, like molasses and coffee, but I’ve been modifying this recipe over the years to the point where this is what I like. Serve this over rice or polenta, garnished with cilantro and maybe some Mexican queso seco, jack cheese or American cheddar.
If you want to go full Mexican here instead of Tex-Mex or Southwest, try my recipe for chile colorado, which is a lot like chili, but is more authentically Mexican.[/summary]
[yield]Serves 8 to 10.[/yield]
Prep Time:[preptime time=1H] 1 hour[/preptime]
Cook Time:[cooktime time=3H] 3 hours[/cooktime]
- [ingredient][amount]1 pound[/amount] [item]pinto beans[/item] or [item]kidney beans[/item] [/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]4[/amount] each, dried [item]ancho[/item], guajillo, pasilla, cascabel, mirasol or mulato chiles[/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1/2 pound[/amount] [item]bacon[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1[/amount] large [item]onion[/item], diced[/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]6 to 8 cloves[/amount] [item]garlic[/item], chopped[/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1[/amount] [item]habanero[/item], fresh, if they’re in season[/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]2 pounds[/amount] [item]ground venison[/item] or [item]ground beef[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1 pound[/amount] [item]sausage[/item], taken out of skin and broken up (venison or pork is fine)[/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]2 tablespoons[/amount] [item]paprika[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]2 tablespoons[/amount]Â [item]cumin[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1 tablespoon[/amount] [item]ground coriander[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]2 tablespoons[/amount] [item]tomato paste[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]1 cup[/amount] of weak [item]coffee[/item][/ingredient]
- [ingredient][amount]3 tablespoons[/amount] [item]molasses[/item][/ingredient]
- Beef or venison broth (have a quart ready)
- At least 2 tablespoons salt
- Cilantro and shredded cheese to garnish
[instructions]
- Soak beans in water overnight. If you have forgotten this, pour boiling water over them and soak for 4 hours, changing the water after 2 hours. Break up and seed the chiles and cover with boiling water. Let stand for an hour or so. Grind to a thick puree, adding about 1 cup of the soaking water and the coffee.
- Chop bacon and fry over medium heat in a Dutch oven or other large, lidded, oven-proof pot. Once the bacon is crispy, remove it and set aside. Add the meat and brown over high heat. You want the highest heat on your most powerful burner here, because the meat will want to steam and stew and not brown. If you are doing a big pot of chili, brown the meat in batches. Stir occasionally as it browns.
- Once all the meat is ready, add the onion to the pot and cook for 4 minutes, stirring often. Return half the bacon to the pot. Add garlic, stir and cook for 1 minute. Add the beans, paprika, cumin, coriander and salt one at a time, stirring to combine each time.
- Add chile puree and tomato paste and stir to combine well. Add the molasses and enough beef broth to cover everything – you want it to be thin like a soup. I typically need at least a pint of broth, sometimes a quart. Stir to combine all this well, bring to a bare simmer and cook gently for 3 hours or so, stirring occasionally. Put the lid halfway over the pot as it cooks. You want it to eventually cook down and be thick.
- Once the beans are tender, if you have the habanero, now’s the time to add it. Serve with rice or cornbread, and top with cilantro, cheese and some of the crispy bacon pieces.
[/instructions]
Peggy: I tend more toward the Italian style, but you could use any sausage. I’ve used chorizo and it works really well. As for the chiles, I would only use 1-2 chipotles, but 4 each of the others. Chipotles can get pretty darn hot.
What kind of sausage do you use in your venison chili? Breakfast or italian.
Also I have Ancho, Guajillo, Negro, Chipotle, Cascabel and Pasilla dried peppers, should I use 4 of each pepper?
I made this wonderful chili yesterday! The best I have ever had! The combination of spices, coffee and molasses was a perfect balance. We all raved over it. Thank you for sharing your recipe, I may not be so generous…. 🙂
Hank, this recipe is a home run! Made it two weeks ago and it was very rich and the dried chilis with coffee added great complexity. Because hunting season starts in a few weeks, I need to make more room in the freezer and this is the recipe I’ll be cooking from. Cheers!
Tomatoes and beans? Not chili. (We Texans can be quite snobbish on this point).
Hank,
Have you ever done this recipe in a slow cooker? Would like to try, but I’m not sure about the cooking time and how that would work with the beans and the liquid…
Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!
Well you have let out my secret! I have been making Chile with the dry red Chile for years and have refused to give out the secret when asked…LOL! I also use it for my Taco’s and Enchiladas.
Now that’s how you make a chili — the more kinds of chiles the better, that’s the point of the dish, is to be made of chiles! And why would anyone ever leave out the beans? I don’t understand it.
Sausage, though, that’s interesting. Don’t think I’ve ever had chili with sausage in it.
This is great! Thanks Hank! I *just* finished grinding up the rest of our harvest and was getting burnt out on venison-bacon sliders (although, I must admit, they are very, very tasty). I’m definately going to try your “backbone.”
Looks fantastic Hank… I just discovered my local Sprouts has a bunch of ground game meats, feral hog, venison, elk, and I think even yak. maybe I should make some up.
Back home I used to make a killer Kangaroo Chilli, but for some reason it’s not very easy to find kangaroo in texas. I always add a few pieces of dark chocolate right at the end, I find it makes a huge difference to the overall texture.
Loving this recipe, and going to try it tomorrow methinks 🙂 I’ve always added dark chocolate to my beef chilli recipe (at least 70% cocoa) – really adds depth of flavour, not sweethness. I tried doing venison chilli recently with venison with chilli and chocolate sausagemeat along with venison mince…needed a little pork fat to loosen it, and that did the trick perfectly. Delicious! Let you know how I go with this recipe though 🙂 Can’t wait! Thanks!
Andrew: Use any random assortment of dried chiles. Some hot, some mild, some in between and you will be fine. Look in Latin markets.
Rhonda: Let me know how you like it!
Bumbling: Yep, I am one of those who take chili seriously. I’ve done a few cook-offs, back in the day, and there have been near-fistfights over the question of beans or no beans, tomato products or no tomato products. Sheesh.
Stella: Thanks so much! You definitely brightened my day! As for wild turkey gizzards, they are so large you may only need 2 to make the dish…
I am a chili snob. I have tried even the award winning chili recipes and cant find the taste Im looking for. I gave up on making chili…til now. Ill give this recipe a try. The coffee and molasses may be the ticket.
We love all things wild. We hunt and fish and forage. Im very grateful to have found this site. Your mustard is amazing. The wild turkey carnitas!…drool. As soon as we collect enough wild turkey gizzards, Im going for the corned gizzards recipe.
You have no idea, Hank, what an absolute inspiration you are. From one wild game cook to another…Thank you for this site.
When can I come for dinner?
This is inspirational and decadent. When I make venison chili, I’m usually pretty stingy with the meat. It’s typically a dish I make to stretch the last of the venison in the freezer or to introduce non-game meat eaters to the power and the glory. I can abide by 2 pounds of ground, but I know my hands would start shaking when I reached for the sausage for uncasing. And the quart of venison stock – that would be rough. That said, a lot of people take chili very seriously and I think it might be time for me to start giving it the resources and love it deserves. Thanks Hank.
Well I have 3 of those chili’s in my arsenal, think I’ll have to look for more, I’ve got some venison in my freezer just waiting to be transformed into good chili!
Gotta try this with the fresh batch of paprika my buddy brought back from his hometown in Hungary!
Molasses and coffee — two of the most underused flavorings out there. Raw cocoa also works as a balancer for sweet. Don’t get many of the peppers you mention in Canada though — basically just habaneros and jalapeños.
Welcome, Susan! No, you definitely cannot go wrong with homemade lard – other than homemade duck fat, it is my favorite. And you know you can never have too many chiles, provided you can dry or pickle them…
Hi, I discovered your blog via Becks & Posh. We eat a lot of wild venison – in fact we had it for dinner last night. Usually we just pan fry it in homemade lard (can’t go wrong with that, LOL), but I’ve been wanting to make venison chili for ages. Your recipe sounds intriguing; I love the combination of ingredients. Thanks for the inspiration – and the reminder that I need to expand the chile section of my kitchen garden this year!
Man, this sounds good!
I’ve only recently started experimenting with the dried chiles from the Mexican market. I haven’t tried the puree as you describe here, but you can bet it’s on my list when I get home from SHOT next week!