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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]
Hi Hank: Made this last year and it was amazing. This time around I’d like to give it a little more heat. Can you recommend specific dried chilies that would do this? (I can’t remember which I used last year, although they were all authentic, from a Mexican market we have nearby.) Also, I was thinking of using cubed black bear meat, which I got from a friend, but have no experience with bear meat. Any thoughts on that? For starters it would be replacing ground meat with cubed steak… Thanks so much for your help with this!
Kyle: You use 1 pound of beans before soaking. Good luck with the recipe!
This looks like a great recipe to use for the ground venison from my first-ever hunt. This might sound like a dumb question, but does this call for 1 lb. of dried beans, or 1 lb of beans after an overnight soak?
Thanks again for the recipe, and all the other great recipes on your site!
I’ve made this chili several times and it is AWESOME! Thanks Hank for the recipe.
My only suggestion is to force the pepper puree thru a sieve to remove the bits of pepper skin that otherwise don’t always soften up.
Love, Love, Love this recipe. I Entered this recipe in a Sub for Santa fund raiser chile cook off at work and won! Not a super competitive contest but there were a total of 10 entries and this chile won. I donated the $50.00 gift certificate back to the cause. The coffee,molasses and variety of peppers added complexity and richness that were pleasantly unexpected. I used chunked venison instead of ground. I used my slow cooker and it worked just fine. Served over fried polenta. Thanks!!
Hello – my husband was lucky and got 2 young does this season, his first season getting into hunting. I have been gathering what I need for some of your recipes including this one. Do you (or any readers) happen to have any online sources for pastured pork fat (to add to make ground meat)? – I’m in a remote area of the Southern California desert and this is hard to come by (I would really prefer fat from pastured animals.)
Just came back from market with peppers, am cooking this tonight. I don’t have an oven pot large enough, though. Am I making a mistake using a slow cooker. Hi temp runs a touch hot on mine, reasonably clsoe to the stated 275F.
Can I safely use it, or should I borrow a larger pot??
keep all recipes comming stews, chilli’s
Will have to try this recipe in the fall. I’ve messed around with a base chili recipe, and now use a 24-bean soup mix, and just soak the beans for 20-24 hrs, plus use ground turkey & beef or venison stew meat. Usually use 3-5 different peppers, plus cinnamon & allspice. I’ve even tried corn kernels & carrots just to see what they would add for sweetness.
Haven’t ever used sausage, broth or coffee in chili – have used coffee to make a Texas-style BBQ sauce.
Was worried there might be too much heat with the dried chilis and habanero, but it’s PERFECT. Flavorful and balanced. Thanks, Hank!
This recipe is fantastic.
Made yesterday, the only minor substitution being that I used brown sugar instead of molasses.
I used kashmiri chilis along with pasilla, ancho, and guajillo; I also used smoked paprika. The sausage used was homemade venison chorizo.
Never had chili with quite this flavor, this is recipe is definitely a keeper.
The best chile I have ever had. Very complex flavors, back of the throat heat, not up front like so many others Loved the smoky flavor, not sure which chile gave it that flavor, ancho perhaps. I entered this in a church chile cook off and tied first place for flavor thanks to your recipe. Will definitely make this again. Looking forward to trying more of your recipes
sounds like a worthy recipe. when venison isn’t available, i substitute lamb, grill the meat over hickory, then chop up, venison or lamb. chocolate? coffee? ABSOLUTELY! Adds wonderful color and depth people can’t quite figure out. I call mine Wicked Willy’s Roadkill Chili. I’ve gotta check this site more, see if there’s a comparison to my Bodacious Billy’s Boulevard Bonanza Brunswick Burgoo.
The chili had so many levels of wonderful complex flavors. My wife and I loved it.
Thanks for the recipe
P.S. love your web site
I saw quite a few comments from people who like how the recipe sounded but had not made it….I thought I’d give feed back on the dish itself. I actually started out by making the Portuguese style brazed venison shanks (also on this website). The liquid had almost dried up from the extended cooking leaving the meat a bit dry. I decided try to salvage it and roll it right into the venison chili. I pulled the shank meat out and chunked it – cutting across the grain. I followed the recipe for the chili more or less. Did not see a need to cook it in the oven since the meat was already tender (cooked it on the stove top instead). Also went heavy on the shank meat and left out the sausage. I think chili should have discrete pieces of actual meat in it. Critique: the best chili I’ve made yet. The ground chili base has a rich, addictive quality. I like the focus on the peppers – most chili’s settle for a little ground cayenne or just some red pepper flakes – the flavorful heat really makes it for me.
This recipe is incredible. We don’t have a large enough oven-safe container, so we used a pressure cooker for steps 6 through 8. For the sausage, we used Palacios chorizo from Spain–it has lots of smoked paprika, which complements everything else really well.
This is by far the best chili I’ve ever had. Thank you for posting this wonderful recipe.
What a great recipe – we live in NE PA and love to eat venison during the entire year…. Will definitely be trying this recipe!
HI-
I just wanted to tell you that my friend and I got some venison while visiting his parents in the Poconos, which is a rarity for us (we live in Boston). We weren’t too sure what to do with it, so we followed your recipe.
OH. MY. GOD.
This is seriously the best chili we have ever made or tasted, and I just wanted to say Thank You!!!!!!!
Dano: Four each, so you are using 16-24 chiles. Just be sure to watch your heat levels, i.e., cascabels are much hotter than anchos or pasilla. My typical combination is: 3-4 ancho, 3-4 guajillo, 3-4 pasilla, 1-2 cascabel or mirasol. Hope that helps!
The chili count is not clear. 4 of each, or 4 in a combination of.