Best Copycat Texas Roadhouse Chili Recipe

🛒 Ingredients in the recipe

• Ground beef - 80%/20% - You could also use beef chuck cut into 1/2 inch cubes
• Garlic - only use fresh diced
• Onion - yellow onion or white onion would be good
• Tomatoes - Do not use fresh but canned tomatoes
• Kidney beans - A true Texas chili does not have beans, they work great in this recipe
• Jalapenos - Use a little or a lot, depending on you your taste buds tolerance to spicy food
• Crushed red pepper flakes - These add another layer of heat to your chili
• Masa harina - This is just traditional corn tortilla flour. It acts as a thickening agent and gives this chile a thick stew-like consistency.
• Cheddar cheese - optional topping
• Red onions - optional topping
• Cowboy Candy - optional topping

See the recipe card for a complete list and quantities.

🔪 Step by step instructions

1. In a dutch oven or large pot on medium heat, cooking the beef. Stir often to help break it apart.

2. Place onion and garlic into the pot and cook for two minutes, stirring often.

3. Drain any extra grease from the pan and return to heat. Stir in chili spices, chili powder, cumin powder, smoked paprika, black pepper, salt, Italian seasoning blend, and brown sugar. Stir the chili mixture well to coat the hamburger. Turn heat to medium-low and continue cooking for one minute.

4. Stir in the crushed tomatoes, kidney beans, vinegar, chili flakes, and diced jalapenos.

5. Bring to a soft boil over medium heat. Stir in the mesa harina.

6. Cook over medium-low heat for 10 more minutes so the chili will thicken.

Hint: If the mesa seems lumpy, stir with a whisk for a minute or two.

🔀 Substitutions

• Instead of ground meat substitute stew meat such as chuck beef cubes that have been cut into 1/2 inch pieces
• You don't have to use beef base meat. You also might like ground turkey or chicken.
• Try fire-roasted crushed tomatoes instead of plain canned tomatoes
• Change up your beans, try pinto, navy beans or black beans.
• Make the chili vegan by skipping the meat and adding a variety of beans.
• Add in diced sweet potatoes and sautéed mushrooms instead of beans

🌶️ Variations

• Top your chili with Cowboy Candy and a side of cornbread.
• Sever over Instant Pot Baked Potatoes and top with cheese.
• Serve over steak fries and top with cheese for a hearty chili cheese fries meal.
• Pour over tortilla chips with topping typically found on nachos
• Make a sourdough bread bowl filled with chili and toppings.
• Serve topped with saltine crackers, onions a dollop of sour cream and hot sauce.
• Add macaroni noodles instead of beans for a great chili mac dinner

💭 Tips for this recipe

Always start with quality ingredients such as grass feed hamburger meat. Also, be sure your seasonings are fresh. They keep in your pantry for 6 months or so but then start to lose some of their flavors.

To drain the fat off of the hamburger, I like to take the pan off the heat and set it on hot pads so one side is a good bit higher than the other. After a few minutes, I place a few wadded-up pieces of paper towel in the lower end of the pan to soak up the grease. Discard paper towel and repeat.