This project is pretty simple. As a complement to each race weekend, I’ll be cooking the national dish of that race’s host country and sharing information about the process and that dish’s history along the way in an effort to grow more deeply immersed in the local culture from my own home.
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“Don't mess with Texas” might have started as the state's official anti-littering slogan, but it's become a way of life here in the Lone Star State — and if there's one thing we take seriously here, it's food. Whether it's our personal spin on Mexican classics or our very particular way of smoking and serving meat, we Texans have a lot of feelings about the things we cook. As you can image, the same thing applies to chili.
What primarily distinguishes Texas chili from other chili recipes you might find is a lack of beans, but it also doesn't feature any tomatoes. It is, largely, a ground beef dish that's seasoned with a spicy chili paste made of dried peppers. Down here, people will get real up in arms if you try to serve them chili and it has either of those two aforementioned sins mixed in.
There's just one problem: I frickin love beans.
At risk of providing you with Too Much Information about myself: I get really fixated on certain ingredients. There will be months where I just cannot imagine myself cooking anything that does not feature, say, mushrooms. I'll add my precious fungi to every recipe imaginable, just to be able to consume my favorite food.
I'm currently in that phase with beans. I never cared for beans, and then one day, they were all I wanted to eat. I've put them in everything (literally: I've even added them to cans of Campbell's soup). So I'm putting them in my chili. I'm also putting tomatoes in my chili. And mushrooms. And corn. I have never enjoyed a bowl of chili that was just ground meat and spices; I want more. That's just the way she goes, friends.
So if you want an authentic Texas chili recipe, you can find one just about everywhere. I'm calling this version Blackstock chili, which counts as a Texas dish because I am Texan, I have been developing it in Texas, and I say it counts.
This Week's Recipe
So, I posted my recipe for this on Substack earlier this week, which you can find here.
My favorite thing about dishes like chili or soup is the fact that they're endlessly customizable and can be altered in about a thousand different ways to suit your tastes. The first chili I ever ate that I actually enjoyed came from the basis of a Tim Horton's recipe, so I'm drawing from that as inspiration. Then, when I first started cooking chili at home, I was using the Casi Terlingua Texas Championship spice blend. Since then, I've been playing around with my own additions to create my own recipe.
If you want an authentic Texas chili recipe, you can find one here. If you want the soup-y Tim Horton's recipe, this is the one I used. If you want to make a white chicken or vegetarian chili instead, I'm not gonna fault you! And if you decide to make a ton of changes to my recipe — I welcome it. It's time to have fun, baby.
You can't have chili without cornbread, and I'm going to be cooking from this Mexican cornbread recipe, courtesy of The Spruce Eats.
This chili is a pretty simple and relaxed dinner that thrives on the whole “set it and forget it” premise. Prep your spice blend and your veggies, then sauté some onions in a large pot, add in your beef and cook until browned, and then toss in your other veggies. Toss in the spice blend, stir it up, and that's it: bring it to a simmer and then just let it sit on the stove, ideally for as long as possible but at least an hour. This is also a great recipe to toss in a slow cooker to really just let it stew.
My biggest concern with the whole cooking process came in the form of my cornbread, because I tried to cook the recipe in a thick glass pan — resulting in a cornbread that took 1000 years to cook and was also never really crisp the way you kinda want cornbread to be. I managed to salvage it by cutting the bread into strips and popping it in the air fryer to really firm up, which ended up being mostly fine. I'm looking forward to remaking the whole endeavor in a different pan, ideally with much more successful results!
I also made some banger dishes out of the leftovers: Chili cheese dogs, and a chili-based sloppy joe. Live your dreams.
So, What's the Verdict?
Listen. I developed this chili recipe. Obviously I think it's great. Obviously I adore it. Obviously I think I killed it, which I always do, because it's my recipe, so why wouldn't I kill at cooking the recipe I made????? This is not my time to be humble. I adore this dish.
My only advice to y’all is to season liberally as you cook! I'm not a professional recipe writer, so I wasn't sure how regularly to tell yall to add salt and pepper to what you're cooking — but you should always be salting and peppering as you go! Give it the business. You wanna layer those seasonings to make sure that every single addition is equipped with tasty goodness. (Obviously don't overdo it, but also: you can never sufficiently salt a dish after you've already cooked it. Those last minute additions won't be enough. This is why tasting as you go is so important!)
I have two favorite months of the year: May and October. May, because it is my birth month and also the month containing the Indianapolis 500. October, because of my family's birthdays, Halloween, and the USGP. If I could only attend two races a year, these are the two I'd pick.
Of course, I'll be at the USGP in Austin this weekend! I don't have any formal meet-ups planned, but if yall will be around, please let me know! I'd like to chat with you fine folks who take the time to read my culinary ramblings — so if that's of interest, please tell me! I'll see about doing a lil shindig at the track between sessions!
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