Chili - meat question
 

Ok guys, I conjure up a very, very good bowl of chili. My meat of choice is 1lb Evans Farm sausage + 1lb 80/20 ground chuck. That combo works very well.

I'm entering a chili 'cook- off' next Sat. I'm thinkin of substituting ground prime rib in place of the chuck. I know the beef flavor will be enhanced, but I think the P/R will be too 'mushy' when ground - that the texture won't be as good as ground beef.

What's your experience?

Let me start by saying that I hate chili.

Having said that, when I'm forced to make it I don't always limit myself to ground meat. I sometimes make something more akin to chilorio. I also have a way of making a beef Burgundy stew that's a little out of the ordinary. I have used ribeye and chuck eye steaks for that, cooked them separately, and added them to the stew at the last moment. I suppose one could do a similar thing with chili. You could cook the chili with chunks of chuck, then swap the chuck for the ribeye at the end.

My experience is that chuck is a flavorful cut. Sometimes you change one thing and it effects another.

Hey asphalt.....I love chili but feel pretty certain you wouldn't be interested in using ground turkey for it like I do. I get heaps of compliments, BTW.

One of the things I do that I think helps is to add some brown sugar in it near the end to mask the acidic tomato taste. I also use mesa flour to thicken it...just a little bit....

And of course the right combinations of spices...including a very measured amount of cayenne pepper - very measured...lol....that stuff is potent!!!

Good luck to you and please provide a followup on how it went! :)

I made chili on Sunday. It was my first time with chunks of chuck and it came out great. I prefer it to ground.

No no no.

LOL

My experience as a computer tech is always use change control. No changes before the big day.

Don't know if you can get it in VA. but when I make chili I use 2 LBs. of chili grind chuck (very course grind) and 1 Lb. of ground pork (regular grind). Virtually all the grocery stores / markets in this part of the world have chili grind chuck. The whole purpose of chili was a way go use less desirable tougher cuts of meat and chili should be somewhat "chunky" for lack of a better term.. not just all ground beef.

and good luck in the cookoff SmileWavy

^^ Hey thanks all^^^ - that just might be the ticket. A courser ground chuck....
There is a Wegman's near me that I shop for special occasions. They'll do just about anything for the customer. I'll ask the meat counter guy when I go for this.

For the record, I've never heard of chili-ground beef, but now I do!

I do either cubed or a combo of cubed and ground.

Cubed is if you are doing a long 4+ hour low and slow cook.

Use roasts for that.

Cheap meats are better for extended cook cycles.

They break down better.

Basically what makes them tough when cooked quick is what makes them like buttah when cooked slow.

If you go with prime, get it coarse ground. That will reduce the mushy.

What to I know...make my chili in a sauce pan and only cook it for like 10 to 15 minutes tops. And without beans. Make 2 kinds, Beef with ground beet and Pork with pork chops.

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If you have a KitchenAid mixer, buy the grinding attachment for it. That way you can grind your own meat however coarse you want it and you get to grind better cuts of meat, because you know what's in it. A lot of the ground meet at stores and butcher shops is leftover crap that otherwise couldn't be sold. it's also usually cheaper. Next time you're at the store, price out some ground meat and then look at the price of the same kind of meat, cut whole.

As a former Terlingua "competitor" do as I did and collect the meat with your car the night before the cook-off.

In before the "beans/no beans" fight

No to the ribeye...too fatty and not much beef flavor once the fat is drained off. You want firmer, more flavorful beef in the sirloin realm. Coarse grind or cubed sirloin is a great idea. We personally use coarse ground and cubed venison and coarse ground venison sausage for our chili. The flavor is much "earthier" than commercial beef but not much different than grass finished beef.

Another thing, to add to the "no changes to the recipe that works" is to tell the butcher the comp' is on Saturday so he can give you the correctly aged beef (21 days) for the day. And best of luck!

Great replies!

I really go for fresh ground whole hog sausage in my chili, much better than ground beef, and a different taste than steak.

I think you are right about the prime rib. Cuts like that need to be eaten as is. Grinding them up destroys them. The eating experience is in the combination of marbling and cooking whole
For your chili, I would choose coarse ground brisket to go with your sausage if you are cooking long and low. Brisket has a texture that pops, rather than mushes, after long cooking, and the flavor is fantastic. The difference is like biting into a sausage or hot dog that has a casing that resists when you first bite into it, but gives way with a pop and floods your mouth with sausagey goodness vs a skinless wienie that surrenders without a fight.
I like to make hamburgers out of 50% generic ground beef (20% fat) and brisket that I grind a little finer that I would use for low and long cooking. Again, it is the flavor and texture of brisket that makes it great.

I only use Angus Chuck Roast, about 3.5 Lbs., cut up in cubes (more or less) for a pot of chili. which will cook for about 2.5 hrs. Super tender, very flavorful.
And no beans in the chili. I heat up some Goya Pinto Beans in case anyone wants some in the bottom of their bowl before the chili goes on top.