Let’s start with one you can do at home for your next run. Keep in mind, too: Chili generally is very flexible, allowing you to tailor it to your liking.
Why chili? It’s versatile -- you can use it so many ways. Chil-mac, hot-dog toppings, chili-cheese fries and potatoes. Cincinnati-style with spaghetti, chili-burger. It’s easy to transform it in a multitude of ways, too. It keeps. One of the best parts about making this recipe at home is you can package it into serving size portions to take on the road.
Decker Truck Line-leased owner-op and cook Thomas Remington's Trucked-up Chili recipe is customizable to a great degree. When he cooked it recently, he added three hot-link sausages chopped in half rounds to spice things up.
Following is the base recipe. When I made it recently, I cooked in my multi-use pot in my truck. At home, a stew pot works just as well, likewise a Crock Pot or other slow cooker.
1 lb. ground beef (80/20 lean/fat works best.)
1 lb. ground pork sausage (Jimmy Dean, Tennessee Pride, etc.)
1 large onion, diced
1 large green pepper, diced
1 14- or 15-oz. can kidney beans (All cans in this recipe are of this size.)
2 cans cooked pinto beans or chili beans
1 can red beans
2 cans diced tomatoes
6 small cans V8 juice (I used the spicy for mine.)
4 tablespoons minced garlic (not the powder)
2 tablespoons black pepper
1 teaspoon liquid smoke
The base recipe is flexible enough to make this any way you like. Whether you like it mild and basic or hot and wild, this will work! Here are a couple ways to doctor it up.
If you like it with some kick, add any of the following:
