Chili Served to Hungry Cowboys on the Trail (2024)

FAQs

What did cowboys eat out on the trail? ›

Granville Stuart, the well known Montana rancher and politician, recorded that cowboys on the trail ate corn meal, sorghum molasses, beans, salt, and bacon. Game, including deer or, while they lasted, buffalo, might add meat to the regimen.

Every cattle drive had chili as a chuck wagon staple, since the native peppers and onions were abundant along the trails. But stories are spread that the beef was too valuable and was limited to be used as food on the cattle drive, so extra protein came from a pot of beans along side the chili pot.

Suppression only fueled this fire and in the 1800's chili was a staple food for cowboys, ruffians, and Adventurers on the Western Frontier. It was even served up in jails. Originally made of dried beef, fat and spices carried in saddlebags, then reconstituted over campfires. It was cheap and hearty and filling.

The endless walking and hard work made even the most delicate appetites ravenous. Hundreds of pounds of dried goods and cured meats were packed into the wagons, including flour, hardtack, bacon, rice, coffee, sugar, beans, and fruit.

Grub: Food in general, especially hearty, filling meals eaten by cowboys out on the range. Chow: Another term for food, often used interchangeably with "grub."

Because chiles were new to the Spaniards, they took the name directly from Nahuatl (the language spoken by the Aztecs). Spaniards decided the word “chili” would mean “hot pepper,” because it reminded them of the spicy flavor of black pepper, which they were familiar with.

Usually, thick slabs of smoked bacon would keep as long as it was protected form the hot temperatures. One way to preserve bacon was to pack it inside a barrel of bran. Also, eggs could be protected by packing them in barrels of corn meal – as the eggs were used up, the meal was used to make bread.

Jerky allowed people to be able to store meat and then consume a high protein source when food was scarce. The early pioneers and cowboys came to rely on jerky as a main staple of their diet.

Bacon was a staple on trail rides and at line camps. The cowboys were actually eating “sowbelly.” It was pork fat from the belly, and perhaps the back and sides, of a hog carcass, cured with salt.

Did cowboys have beans in their chili? ›

The earliest versions of chili, Guerra posits, would have been made with meats such as venison, rabbit and turtle. It was cowboys who brought beef to the dish, but those same cowboys also kept beans in it.

Chili with beans could be called chili frijoles or chili con carne con frijoles. I've not seen any other name than “chili with beans.”

What primarily distinguishes Texas chili from other chili recipes you might find is a lack of beans, but it also doesn't feature any tomatoes. It is, largely, a ground beef dish that's seasoned with a spicy chili paste made of dried peppers.

Pumpkin and apple pies, wild strawberry dumplings, molasses pudding, potato pudding, cakes, ginger bread and vinegar lemonade must have delighted the family palates.

Free lunch. The free lunch was a sales enticement which offered a meal at no cost in order to attract customers and increase revenues from other offerings. It was a tradition once common in saloons in many places in the United States, with the phrase appearing in U.S. literature from about 1870 to the 1920s.

Prior to 1870, a few basic staples dominated the menu in all cow camps. These included coffee, bread (in the form of biscuits, corn meal, or hard crackers), meat (bacon, salt pork, beef—fresh, dried, salted and smoked—and wild game), salt, and some sugar and sorghum molasses.

One item he includes is his canvas bedroll. Today, this item is most commonly called a cowboy bedroll. These basic shelters were commonly used across the frontier and can still be part of your camping gear today. They are simple, functional, and only required a few materials to create.