Easy Beef Chili (Thick and Ready in 35 Minutes)
It’s the first properly cold night and you want chili, and you don’t want to stand over a pot for three hours to get it. My Easy Beef Chili is the thick homemade chili you want on the menu! My secret ingredient makes every pot of chili perfectly packed with flavor and quite honestly, craveable.
Thirty five minutes from cold pan to bowl, and it comes out THICK. Not soupy. Not watery. Not the kind of chili where all the good stuff sinks and you’re left drinking the rest of it. Thick enough that the sour cream sits on top where you put it and the cheese melts into a puddle instead of disappearing. There’s one ingredient doing that work, it isn’t flour, and it isn’t time. I’ll get to it.
This is a homemade chili that tastes like it took all afternoon and yet it only takes about half an hour. Rich, deeply seasoned, a little smoky if you want it that way, and thick enough to hold a spoon up. It’s what you want on the first cold night of the year, and it’s fast enough to be a Tuesday in the middle of a busy week. One pot. Nothing in it you have to go looking for.
What you need
Almost all of this is pantry or freezer, and half of it’s already in your cupboard right now. The one that might surprise you is the can of refried beans, and that’s the one doing the most work in the whole pot.
- lean ground beef
- salt
- pepper
- chili powder
- smoked paprika
- garlic powder
- cumin
- cinnamon
- onion
- green pepper
- crushed tomatoes
- tomato sauce
- kidney beans
- refried beans
Why there’s cinnamon in here
Half a teaspoon, and you will not taste cinnamon. I promise.
What it does is round everything off. Chili powder and cumin are a little sharp and a little dusty on their own. Tomato has a bright acidic edge to it. A bit of cinnamon sits underneath all of that and smooths the corners. It’s the difference between a chili that tastes like a pile of spices and a chili that tastes finished. There’s a long history of it too, in Cincinnati chili and in a lot of Mexican cooking, where warm spices in savory food isn’t strange at all.
That said, some people taste cinnamon in everything and they don’t want it anywhere near dinner. If that’s you, or your family, leave it out. The chili is still good. I’d rather you make it without than not make it.
Why there’s a can of refried beans in Chili
This is the actual trick and it’s the reason this chili is thick in thirty five minutes.
Refried beans dissolve. They break down into the liquid and give the whole pot body, the way a long simmer would, except you’re not waiting for a long simmer. No flour, no cornstarch, no masa, no roux, no reducing it by half while everybody gets hungrier. You stir in a can and twenty minutes later you’ve got a chili with actual texture to it instead of seasoned tomato water with beef in it.
It adds flavor too, more bean and a little creaminess, but the body is the point.
If you leave it out, the chili’s still perfectly nice. It’s just thinner, and you’ll want to simmer it longer with the lid off to get anywhere close. Which is fine if you’ve got the time and completely misses the point if you don’t.
Taste it before you serve it
Do this every single time, and I mean it.
Chili powder is not a standard thing. One brand is mild and mostly sweet paprika, another has real heat in it, and a third is honestly about half salt and oregano. Three tablespoons of one is not three tablespoons of another, and there’s no way for me to know which jar is in your cupboard.
Canned tomatoes and canned beans swing all over the place on salt too. So the little bit of salt called for in the recipe may not be enough, OR it may be too much. If you think it’s going to be too salty wait until it’s halfway done simmering and then taste it an add the salt if you need it.
Other beans that work
Kidney beans are what I’ve written here, but chili is forgiving, use what beans you like. Black beans, pinto beans, red beans, all of them work. Pinto beans are the closest swap and nobody will notice. Black beans hold their shape better and bring a slightly sweeter note.
If you go with great northern or cannellini they will go soft and mild and make the whole pot look different. It’s FINE but you need to know up front.
Chili beans in sauce work too, just remember they come already seasoned and usually salted, so go easy at the end and taste before you add anything.
The refried beans can flex as well. Black refried beans do the same job, and the vegetarian ones are right there next to the regular ones in every store I’ve been in.
And if this is a week where the grocery money is tight, add a second can of whatever beans you’ve got. It stretches this pot to feed more people for about a dollar, it’s how chili has been fed to families forever, and nobody at your table is going to say a word about it.
What to serve with it
Cornbread, obviously, and I’d point you at the cast iron skillet jalapeño cornbread because the heat plays well against a thick chili.
Cat head biscuits if you’d rather have something soft to push the last of it around the bowl with.
And if you’ve got leftovers and you’re not in the mood for another bowl of chili, spoon it over loaded air fryer totchos and call it a completely different dinner.
How to store it
Chili is cooked meat, so it follows the leftovers rule and not the pot on the stove rule. Get it into the refrigerator within 2 hours of it coming off the heat, and it keeps 3 to 4 days.
One thing that matters here. Don’t put the whole dutch oven in the fridge with the lid on. A big deep pot of hot chili holds its heat for HOURS in there, it takes ages to come down through the temperature range where you don’t want it sitting, and it warms up everything around it besides. Ladle it into shallow containers instead and it cools fast and safely. Two minutes of work while the kitchen’s still a mess.
Reheat it on the stove over medium low with a splash of water if it’s tightened up, which it will have, because that’s what a thick chili does overnight.
It freezes beautifully for 3 months. Shallow containers again, or freezer bags laid flat, which stack better and thaw faster. Thaw it overnight in the refrigerator.
And here’s the good news about all of it. Chili is BETTER on day two. The spices have had time to settle into each other and the whole thing tastes rounder. So if you’ve got a busy week coming, making this a day ahead isn’t a compromise, it’s the better plan.
Easy Beef Chili
Ingredients
- 1 lb lean ground beef
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 2 tsp chili powder add more as needed or desired, use chipotle for a spicy smoky kick
- 1 tsp smoked paprika optional if you like it spicy
- 2 tsp garlic powder or granules more as desired
- 1 1/2 tsp cumin more as desired
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon optional
- 1 cup onion chopped
- 1/2 cup green pepper chopped
- 15.5 ounces crushed tomatoes
- 8 oz tomato sauce
- 15.5 ounces kidney beans undrained
- 16 ounces refried beans generally 1 can
Instructions
- Heat a Dutch oven over medium high heat
- Add the ground beef in a single layer and use a wooden spoon to break it up. Try to get as much of the meat touching the pan as you can
- Sprinkle all the seasonings over the top and stir to combine
- Add the onions and green pepper and cook until the meat is browned and the onions are translucent
- Drain the beef if needed
- Add the crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, undrained kidney beans, and refried beans
- Bring to a quick boil, cover, reduce the heat, and simmer for 15-20 minutes
- Taste and add more chili powder and salt if desired
- Serve hot with your favorite toppings
