Cheryl's Totally Texas Award-Winning Chili

Ingredients:

• 3 pounds ground beef 80/20
• 1 pound ground pork
• 4 slices bacon
• 3-4 cloves garlic, finely minced
• 1 large yellow onion
• 3 cans Stewed Tomatoes
• Kosher salt
• Freshly ground pepper
• Dried Oregano
• Ground Cumin
• Gebhardt's Chili Powder (has to be!)
• 1 fresh jalapeno, size of your thumb
• SECRET INGREDIENT: Pickled jalapenos, and juice from pickled jalapenos jar
• you want fatty beef.  Trust me.
• Masa Flour (~5-6 T.) To thicken at the end

Instructions:

Drizzle some olive oil in a dutch oven/wok pot and turn stove to medium heat.  Chop raw bacon (tip: use scissors!) into bite size pieces and cook, flipping until cripsy, and remove.

Add the ground beef, chopped onion, and garlic to pot, and season with heaping 1/2 tsp of kosher salt and pepper.  Stir it all together nicely (a chopping action with a wooden spoon is perfect).

Once the ground beef starts to brown, season with your first round of dried oregano, ground cumin, and Gebhardts chili powder – 1 heaping teaspoon of each.  (OR SEE DISCLAIMER NOTE BELOW).  Stir/chop nicely again.  You want the beef to have LOTS of flavor!

Once the beef is browned, I personally let it cook more in that fat from the bacon.  Feel free to drain the fat off if you prefer however.  (I think there’s some official proper cooking rule about not letting ground beef boil after browning… but I rebel!)

Crumble the cooked bacon and add back in.

Chop a few pickled jalapeos (to taste, I use about 5), and add to meat.  Then pour about 1/8 cup of the pickled jalapeno juice onto the meat and stir.  You want to hear the sizzle and scrape the bottom of the pot!

Season again with salt, pepper, dried oregano, ground cumin, and chili powder.  I do generous sprinkling two times around the pot, and my calculations say that’s about 1/2 tsp.  turn up the heat to high.

Add the cans of stewed tomatoes.  Stir and start to break up the tomato pieces.

Make slits in the jalapeno with a knife.  Submerge into the chili.

Season one more time with 1/2 teaspoon ish salt, pepper, dried oregano, ground cumin, and chili powder and stir.

As soon as the chili reaches a bubbling boil, turn down to low.

Let the chili simmer until it reached the consistency you want.  If you want it more soupy, it should be ready in about 30 minutes.  If you want it like a real cowboy, it could simmer for a good 2 hours.  Don’t forget to stir occasionally and always scrape the bottom of the pot!

Don’t forgot to taste once it’s cooled off from boiling.  Doctor as needed with the spices.  In my experience, it usually needs a tad more salt and oregano.  If you want more heat (chili powder has the after taste of heat), sprinkle more chili powder.

DISCLAIMER: I have never measured the spices.  I just sprinkle and go with it.  I conservatively calculated the amount I normally use for this recipe.  My recipe calls for 2 TBL chili powder (when I make a large pot of this I use 1/3 cup chili), and a little less of cumin and oregano to give you an idea, so if you want measure that out separately and then divy up that amount to season the 3 separate times I mention (ground beef, post ground pork, post stewed tomatoes). 

Remove the jalapeño and discard.  Dish up in bowls and garnish with shredded sharp cheddar cheese, sour cream, and crushed tortilla chips.