When You Should Add Spices To Chili For The Absolute Best Flavor

There are several things you can do to improve your chili game including giving it plenty of cook time, making sure your flavors are balanced, and picking the perfect garnishes. When it comes to adding your spices, it's important to add them early. Brown your meats and soften your veggies first, and then drop in your spices. Spices have natural oils in them and by stirring them into your hot pot for a couple of minutes, they'll "bloom" and toast, which means they will release their oils, creating depth and much more flavor than if you add the spices later.

Chili spices largely include chili powder, paprika, onion and garlic powder, cumin, salt and pepper, and sometimes cayenne, oregano, and red pepper flakes. There are even recipes that include unsweetened cocoa powder for depth — this can be added and bloomed with all of your other spices too. Once heated, toasted, and stirred, you can add your liquids, whether that's beer, broth, or tomato sauce, which will all help release any spices and other ingredients that might have stuck to the bottom of the pot.

Chili might seem like a dish that's thrown together by simply adding a lot of different ingredients at once, but the reality is that a great chili takes time and attention to detail. Just like blooming your spices, other steps should be intentional as well. When you cook your meat, whether that's ground beef or turkey, or cubed sirloin steak, give yourself plenty of time to actually let it brown, not just cook. When the meat builds a browned crust, that equals tons of flavor. Depending on the size of your cooking pot, you may have to do this step in stages, because if you add too much meat, it will end up steaming instead of browning.

You should also pay attention to the balance of flavor. Does it taste too acidic from the tomatoes? Maybe you need to add some sweetness; brown sugar is a good choice. Can you barely taste the cumin? Go ahead and add a little more — don't worry about the fact that you can't bloom it at this point, you'll still get the flavor in there. Do you want it to be more spicy? Shake some hot sauce in or a pinch of cayenne. Do you want it to be thicker? Add some cornmeal or masa harina. Chili is a dish that only gets better as it sits. We don't mean you should leave it on the counter for days, but rather, after it's cooked, it will generally taste even better the next day, so long as you put it in the fridge overnight.