Texas Red Chili

Mi amiga Heather Bassett gave me this recipe.  One day last fall I knew I wanted to make chili, but didn't have a tried and true recipe.  I thought, "who can I trust to have a good recipe?" Heather was the first person I called, and sure enough, that night I was in chili heaven. 

As side note, I've never found ground ancho or pasilla chili peppers. I found them dried in the produce section and intended to find a mortar and pestle when my personal witch doctor, Mary Hales, let me know that any herbalist worth her salt had a coffee bean grinder.  So she hooked me up.  It only took a few minutes and voila: ground ancho/pasilla chili pepper.  

Ingredients
3 1/2 - 4 lbs. ground beef
1 TB corn oil
1/4 lb bacon diced
3 c chopped onion
2c green pepper
2 medium jalepenos
2 heaping TB garlic
4 cups beef broth or stock
28 oz. can crushed tomatoes
2 bay leaves
1 cinnamon stick
Kosher Salt (to taste)
Black pepper (to taste)
2 TB ground ancho chili pepper
1 TB ground pasilla chili pepper
2 TB cumin
1 1/2 TB brown sugar
1 TB dried oregan
Juice of half a lime
2 TB of chopped cilantro

Instructions
1. Brown the meat. Drain and set aside.
2. Cook bacon in corn oil. Take bacon out but leave the grease in the pan.
3. Sautee onions and garlic in grease. Then add everything but oregano, lime juice and cilantro.
4. Simmer for 1 1/2 - 2 hours
5. Add oregano, lime juice and cilantro right at the end.
6. Add Red Hot if you want to spice it up.