Chili colorado, aka ‘Texas Red’, is meat chunks in a thick sauce. Very good, and versatile too. Not only can you eat it out of a bowl, you can also wrap it up in a flour tortilla for a burrito. Tito’s Tacos in Culver City, CA does that. They use the same chili colorado for a bowl of chili and for their beef burrito.
IIRC Kimball believes bell peppers are “too spicy” 
And, also, now that I think of it, while I grew up here in Chicago, well within “chili with beans” country, when I think of the iconic bowls of Chicago chili: Lindy’s and the now-defunct Ramova grill, they both were served by default without beans. Now, they didn’t look or taste like bowls of Texas red either. They were on the soupy side, heavy on the tomato sauce, with Ramova’s resembling much more a Cincinnati style chili with its spicing. But neither included beans. Bishop’s, though, did have beans (and it looks like they still exist in the Western suburbs.)
Frito pie/pepper bellies/walking tacos are meant for canned chili. But for burgers and dogs, I like the copycat Tommy’s recipe. If I didn’t use good hot dogs, my chili dogs would taste just like Wienerschnitzel’s. (OK, maybe that’s not a ringing endorsement. But I like Wienerschnitzel’s chili cheese dogs!) It’s been too long since I’ve had a Tommy burger, so I can’t honestly say mine taste the same as theirs. But they’re darned good. I’ve never been happy with canned chili on burgers and dogs.
Awesome idea, done. How much did s/he use: one bulb, two? Fine dice, leave it stringy? Simmer the tops in the chili, or save for stock?
Fennel’s on sale around here too and so are some great air-chilled low-salt chickens. Looks like dinner’s set for the next week, as soon as this pot of red chili gets eaten.
I’ll ask. I don’t remember him including the tops, and my recollection is that he cut it up fairly finely, so it blended in with the rest of the chili.
I had to get another 5 pounds of bacon from Cash & Carry, and I’m getting low on cayenne pepper. So as long as I was there I picked up a container of their First Street chili powder. I’ll try it for chili colorado just to see how it is. If it’s not as good as Gebhardt’s, I can always use it in one of my rubs.
I’ll share again how Mrs. L.A. makes ‘chili’: Cans of chili (Nally or Dennison’s, whatever’s at the Dollar Store), cans of mixed vegetables, cans of corn, and cans of diced tomatoes. It’s more like chili-flavoured soup. It’s good, but it ain’t chili!
Well, you have to add your own heat. Most “mild” premixed chili powders contain only ancho, which DOES give a mellow depth of flavor.
I use dried chipotle and crushed red pepper to provide the OOOMPH.
Here’s what I do when I’m rolling my own, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned in one of the bajillion chili threads here on the dope:
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Ancho chile as a base. It’s fruity, mild, and a little bit earthy. A good ancho chili reminds me a little bit of being slightly raisiny in terms of flavor. Nice backbone to build the chili on.
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Pasilla/chile negro - another nice, sweet chili, usually low heat chile. Pairs well with the ancho.
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Guajillo - maybe a little bit more herbal than the above, and definitely more of a kick of heat, a little touch of smokiness.
So those three are my basic mild-to-medium base. On top of that, I will also add my “heat” chilies:
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Cascabel, pequin, árbol. - Any of these are added for pungency and sharp heat. Cascabel has more complex flavor than the other two, but I usually don’t have them around. I will also feel free to use any spicy chile that I happen to have dried from the garden, which can be Thai chilis, cayenne, tabasco, etc. I avoid habaneros or any Capsicum chinense peppers. I’m a huge chili head, but I don’t like those flavors in my chili (or if I want it, I’ll add it at the table.) They just throw off what I like my chili to taste like
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Smoky peppers. If you like a bit of smoke in your chili, chipotles, or if you can find moras or moritas, those work, too. You can even use Spanish smoked paprika.
And that’s basically the idea I have in mind if I’m doing my own chile base completely from scratch.
Now, I did leave out one thing. Once again, harking back to my experiences with Hungarian cuisine, I also use a good amount of quality Hungarian sweet paprika as part of the base, along with the anchos, guajillos, pasillas. I find it really solidifies the fruit and earthiness of the chile without adding any heat. They are all chili peppers, so it’s still in keeping with the idea of using chiles as the base. But it has to be good Hungarian paprika (or Penzey’s actually has a good California sweet paprika that I recommend, as well.)
A comment about chili powder mixes and other chili spices: if you can’t remember the last time you used it, or it’s more than a year old, throw it out and buy a new can/bottle/bag. Stale spices can ruin a dish.
pulykamel @69:. Excellent choices for base chiles! Unfortunately, NYC still has fewer Mexican-Americans than Chicago, so it’s damn hard to locate the hotter chiles unless you plan special trips…so I depend on Penzey’s excellent ground chipotle, crushed red pepper or cayenne, and the random shot of various hot sauces.
I stopped in a small grocery in California farm country once — inland from Monterey — and the entire front of the store was filled with huge open sacks of every chile you could think of. Here, you can only find a small rack of cellophaned ancho, guajillos, negroes, or pasillas, and only two varieties at one time.
OK, they sent me the recipe. I remember it being chicken, but it’s actually pork (though it should work fine with chicken, I would think. That said, pork & fennel do have a special affinity for one another, in my opinion.)
2 lb ground pork
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup chopped fennel
1 cup green bell peppers, cut into 1/4 inch dice
1 to 2 red or green jalapeno peppers
1 teaspoon ground cumin
2 garlic cloves, pushed through a press
1 15 oz can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 teaspoon salt
Sour cream and chopped cilantro for garnish.
There also appear to be some notes here, some that I can’t quite make out (his wife emailed me a scan of the recipe). For the fennel it says “at least 2 bulbs.” For the cumin it says “more or less, often more.” For the garlic it says “always more garlic.” And then a note at the end “I was surprised how much I learned to love fresh fennel.”
But the basic idea is fry the pork, onion, and fennel together until pork begins to brown. Then add bell pepper, jalapeno, and cumin. About 5 more minutes until the pork is browned. Then garlic for a minute more. Then add beans, broth, and salt. Simmer, cook for a bit, and then mash some of the beans to thicken.
Around here chili dogs are a “my turn to cook dinner and I don’t feel like cooking” meal, so home-made chili is a non-starter. Of course, if I was smart (like I have ever been accused of that!) next time I was anywhere near a Tommy’s I but a gallon or so of their chili, bring it home and freeze it in meal-sized portions. But I never remember to do that.
jz78817 - You are correct. Chris Kimball can’t stand anything spicier than white bread.
Make a bunch. Portion into zip-top bags and keep them in the freezer for ‘I don’t feel like cooking’ days.
If I didn’t have access to Wolf, that’s what I’d do. But I do, so I don’t.
What I’d really like is access to fresh Skyline chili for my dogs, but that’s a whole 'nother war. 
That looks very good pulykamell. But my idea of chili is that it’s a meal in itself. The beans and tomatoes and other veggies round it out. Just like a good soup. For myself, a bowl of beef does not constitute a meal. Do you serve it with sides? Perhaps that’s the sticking point for me. Chili, to me, is a meal in itself.
Are crackers a side? Because that’s all chili needs. The very idea that a bowl should have all the basic food groups in it is ridiculous. Celery? Why not throw in carrots, potatoes, kohlrabi and some broccoli while you’re at it? Because once you start opening the door to everything in the vegetable kingdom, it ain’t chili no more. It’s some other dish that has chilis in it.
How about flour tortillas instead? Not only can you eat them, they can also be used as napkins.
Cold beer (and napkins).
I haven’t had tommys since ours on 10th st closed years ago … only one AV one left is in palmdale … and weinerschnitzel spiced up theirs to the point people in the house don’t/cant eat it… but they started selling it in the stores so you might be able to find it online
So I console my self with the chiliburger from crazy ottos…(its open face and so big you eat it with cutlery )