Jamie Deen's Award-Winning Chili Recipe with Beer (2024)

FAQs

Does adding beer to chili make it better? ›

Not only does beer work to cut the heat and spice of a proper bowl of red, but the residual sweetness in most beers nicely complements the caramelized meat. Since it's the perfect thing to drink with chili, plenty of people consider adding beer to their chili recipe, but which beer style should you choose?

Stout is a perfect base ingredient for stew, so it's also a natural ingredient for chili. Hey, chili is a kind of stew, right? And we know that beef goes well with stouts. You can go for the rich malts of a time-honored favorite like Guinness, but imagine the possibilities.

Add beer. Beer is an awesome flavor enhancer to chili, but it also does a great job at thickening chili, too. The main reason for this is because beer contains starch, which, as we know from earlier in this blog post, is often used as a thickening agent.

Cocoa powder, bacon, cinnamon, ground coffee and tomato paste will all add a rich sweet & salty flavors that are sure to surprise and delight. Warming spice blends, like Garam Masala, Ras el Hanout or Baharat are another simple and delicious way to add layered flavors to this simple one-pot meal.

For cooking, use brown ales for pork, beef, stews and chilis. They also work well in batters and in baking. Porter: Another type of ale, porters are medium-bodied with a cocoa-like sweetness. They're also medium hoppy, so less bitter than a pale ale and less sweet than a brown ale.

The chili made with beer didn't seem to have any hoppy or bitter flavors, seemingly having been completely eradicated in the cooking process. The chili made with only chicken stock, rather than beer, had a creamier, mellower flavor, which was overwhelmingly chicken-y, despite its beef content.

The best meat for chili depends on the type you're making, but professionals generally use a combination of ground chuck, brisket, short ribs, or diced tri-tip sirloin mixed with bacon and sausage to layer multiple textures and flavors.

A good starting point is three grams of peppers per liter of wort (0.1 oz. of peppers per quart of wort). Good luck with your pepper homebrew!

The good news is there are lots of easy ways to thicken up your chili with ingredients you likely already have in your pantry— flour, cornmeal, pureed beans, cornstarch, or even crushed tortilla chips will help do the job, along with some good old extra simmering time.

What is the best beer for chili? ›

The best type of beer for chili is typically a darker, maltier beer such as a stout, porter, or brown ale.

For quicker-cooking chili like this recipe, don't cover the pot. You want the liquid in the chili to reduce, and leaving the lid off is crucial. If you're simmering the chili for a longer time, partially cover the pot to prevent the liquid from evaporating too quickly.

The longer you cook, the more alcohol cooks out, but you have to cook food for about 3 hours to fully erase all traces of alcohol. A study from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Nutrient Data lab confirmed this and added that food baked or simmered in alcohol for 15 minutes still retains 40 percent of the alcohol.

Chilies get their spice from a naturally occurring chemical compound called capsaicin, which basically acts as an irritant to your mouth. Because beer is water-based — and because capsaicin isn't absorbed by water — it simply spreads the capsaicin around in your mouth, doing nothing to counteract the sensation.

Booze. Dark, rich stouts or a couple glugs of red wine have an extremely welcome place in any chili situation. The alcohol will cook off, leaving behind a rich, deep flavor that will pair up nicely against the heat and smoke of the surrounding ingredients.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), baked or simmered dishes that contain alcohol will retain 40% of the original amount after 15 minutes of cooking, 35% after 30 minutes and 25% after an hour. But there's no point at which all of the alcohol disappears.