Feng Shui Texas Chili

Inspired by Toytown's Annual Chili Cookoff and motivated by the cold weather, we decided to try our hand at making chili this weekend.

I wanted a hot chili, with lots of shredded beef, so we used Kent Rathburn's recipe (see below - unfortunately I just saved it on email from an old Jasper's newsletter, so don't have a link to give).  It's a hearty Texas style chili (without beans, and often without tomato), and ours tasted a bit like Carolina barbecue after we had finished. Authentic or not, it was tasty and a really good first effort. We'll work on perfecting a good Texas/Asian chili this winter!

It's always a bit of an experiment when using an American recipe and trying to figure out what the ingredients are in German supermarkets, but we figured goulasch beef would be an excellent choice. and it was - not only did it fall apart perfectly, but we didn't have to do any cutting!

We had planned to try to make chili with a little Asian flair in the spices, but when I saw the packages available, I knew we had the perfect starting point....what could be better than using a lucky amount of 0.888kg of beef????  Hence the "Feng Shui" part of the recipe.

And, of course, it's a great excuse to make cornbread! 

We had a little accident resulting in too much salt in ours to start with, but were able to remedy it with some tasty Andechs Berg Bock Hell, giving it a nice little bit of sweetness to balance out the spices. We also added some cardamom for taste and substituted cayenne powder for ancho, as none was available here.  If you want your chili super hot, you can do as we did and use roasted habanero peppers in place of the poblanos. However, it's REALLY hot...trust me....Despite all precautions of wrapping hands in baggies and not touching my face, etc....running the knife under water managed to send all the habanero spiciness into the air, and me running outside to gulp down cold air to stop the burning....always an adventure in the kitchen around here! 

Also, we don't have a grill, so we just browned the meat in the soup pot, then removed it to cook the onions. Worked well! Cooking long and on low will make the meat fall apart perfectly.

Beer-Braised Sirloin Chili

(Recipe from Kent Rathburn)
Marinade:
2 lbs top sirloin steak, trimmed
2 Tbsp canola oil
Juice of 4 limes
8 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallots, minced
2 Tbsp cilantro, chopped
1 Tbsp black pepper, coarsely crushed
1 jalapeno pepper, stem/seeds removed, minced
1 Tbsp salt

Chili:
2 Tbsp canola oil
2 large onions, peeled and diced
8 cloves garlic, minced
2 Tbsp ancho chile powder
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp ground coriander seeds
2 bottles (12 oz each) Mexican beer
2 poblano peppers, roasted, peeled, seeds and stems removed, diced
1 tsp salt
Juice from 2 limes
1/2 cup chopped green onions
1 Tbsp chopped cilantro

1. Cut the steak into four pieces, each about 8 ounces.

2. Marinate beef in the oil, lime juice, garlic, shallots, cilantro, pepper, jalapeño, and salt for at least three hours, or overnight.

3. Prepare the grill (using hickory or mesquite if possible). Cook the meat to medium doneness on an open flame. Let the meat cool, then dice into one half inch cubes. Set aside.

4. In a large sauce pot, add the oil and sauté the onions and garlic until translucent.

5. Add in meat pieces and cook on medium heat until most of moisture is gone.

6. Stir in ancho chile powder, cumin, and coriander; then deglaze with beer.

7. Continue cooking on medium heat until meat is tender and sauce starts to thicken.

8. Add diced chilis and finish with kosher salt and lime juice. Garnish with green onions and chopped cilantro.