To Bean or Not to Bean: The Great Texas Chili Debate

About author / Josh Gunn

Bachelor chef; southern cooking; mixologist; university professor. Josh's recipes will delight (and sometimes terrify) you.

At a workplace potluck recently I ate, for the first time, Texas chili. I have never really cared for the stuff because, where I'm from (Georgia), the chili has kidney beans in it, and I am not a fan of kidney beans in the least. I am not a fan because (a) they don't taste good to me, and I hate the texture; and (b) well, um, have you ever seen Blazing Saddles?

At the potluck, however, the sign in front of the chili said "REAL Texas Chili," with the "REAL" underlined twice. "What makes it real?" I asked someone close by. "They ain't no beans, baby!" he replied. I tried a bite, and after I recovered from my face falling off, I tried another, and another, and another. It was hot as Hades, but it was very tasty. I have still yet to discover who made the stuff, but when I do I'll coax the recipe out of 'em and post it here.

Meanwhile, let me detail the great controversy over chili: whether or not you should add beans. I've heard some people disagree about the kinds of peppers one should use, if tomatoes or tomato sauce is allowed, and so forth, but hands down "to bean or not to bean" is the question. I've perused many Texas and Tex-Mex cookbooks since my discovery of Texas chili, and there are beanless and beanfull recipes listed in equal measure. So I started asking my friends who are from Texas: "Do you put beans in your chili?" Every time the answer came back with a resounding "NO!"

So the next obvious question to ask is "why?" Why can't I put beans in the chili? The answers I got were about authenticity; "Texas chili should not have beans," Texans say, over and over like a kind of mantra. "We don't use filler!" someone else told me. So the answer is about identity, about what it means to be a Texan, and what one should do to advertise his or her Texas pride. I suspect such religiosity is closely related to what seems to be the origins of the dish.

Some have argued that chili originated from Mexico. However, it's still not widely made there---at least where one would expect to find it, which means non-touristy places. This suggests Texas is probably the place from which all chili recipes hail. The consensus of food scholars is that chili probably was a dish invented during cattle drives, when only meat and hot peppers were copious. Over the years it evolved into increasingly complex and nuanced flavors, and eventually some folks probably started putting beans into the chili.

I think I have become a convert to the Texas way, however. I still don't identify as a Texan, but I think the beanless chili just tastes better. This week for the first time I made chili from a recipe that I made-up by combining a number of different recipes I've looked at. Basically, I altered the recipes based on stuff I already had in the kitchen, but strangely the substitutions came out just fine. I made a huge pot of the stuff, and discovered every night it sat in the fridge, it tasted better and better. I also invented what I'm calling a "Texas Chili Dog," a recipe I'll share with you next week. In the meantime, y'all bachelors might like this: it actually tastes better as a leftover, and we single guys always have leftovers.

Serves/Makes: 10

• 4 slices bacon
• 2 1/2 pounds chili meat or lean ground beef (93% lean)
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1 1/2 cup Zing Zing or similar bloody mary mix
• 1 pint Shiner Bock (or similar) beer
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 medium green bell pepper, chopped
• 8 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon ground oregano (or more, to taste)
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 5 tablespoons quality chili powder (or more, to taste)
• salt (to taste)
• 4 jalapeno peppers, chopped (or more, to taste)

***Optional***

• 2 tablespoons masa harina, dissolved in
• 2 tablespoons water

***Toppings***

• shredded cheddar cheese
• green onions, chopped