Being a cowboy in the Old West was a hard life, with few luxuries. A cattle drive could easily take cowboys out on the trail for a month or more, and even on the ranch they often lived in pretty basic conditions – bunkhouses with crude cooking facilities were the norm.
Because they worked long days of hard physical labor in all weathers, they needed a lot of food to keep them going. And, because of that lack of luxuries, good food was important for morale. The problem was that, whether on the ranch or the trail, they didn’t have a lot to cook with.
Luckily they had a secret weapon that let them prepare a wide range of tasty meals even over a simple campfire. In movies we usually see cowboys with a coffee pot and a skillet, and those were important to them, but the real heart of cowboy cooking was the Dutch oven.
A Dutch oven is a heavy item, but while cowboys couldn’t take a lot of personal belongings on a cattle drive – most of their personal belongings had to be carried on their horse – there was always the chuck wagon. As well as carrying water, bedding and most of the food needed on a long drive, this also had space for cooking equipment.
⇒ How to Build the Oven That Cooks Without Fire, Fuel, Smell, or Smoke
That equipment almost always included at least one Dutch oven, because cowboys loved them. A Dutch oven can be used to boil, simmer, sauté or even bake. If you want to cook a tasty, filling meal, and get enough to feed a dozen hungry cowboys, these big, versatile pans are the best way to do it. These classic cowboy recipes show why.
Beans and Bacon
On the trail, cowboys had to rely on preserved foods that traveled well. Sometimes an animal would die or be slaughtered, giving them fresh beef, or they’d be able to hunt or forage, but most of their meals were cooked from the supplies they carried with them. Dried beans and bacon were cowboy staples, and this classic recipe uses both.
Ingredients:
- 2.5 cups dried Navy beans
- 4oz bacon or salt pork
- 1 pinch baking soda
- 1 tbsp molasses
- 1 tsp salt
Soak the beans for at least eight hours, then drain them and throw away the water. Put the beans in the Dutch oven and sprinkle the baking powder on top. If you’re using salt pork, rinse it.
Add the pork or bacon to the beans, cover with cold water, bring to the boil and simmer for an hour, skimming the top occasionally.
Drain again, add enough cold water to reach the top of the beans, bring to the boil again and cook for about ten minutes until the beans are soft.
Add the salt and molasses, stir to coat the beans, then put the lid on the Dutch oven and bake, either in the oven at 350° F or at the edge of a fire with embers piled on the lid, for half an hour.
Related: Canning Mormon Beans for Long Term Preservation
This is a basic recipe that uses only typical chuck wagon supplies. If they had them, cowboys often added chopped onion or bell peppers as well as other seasonings.
Trail Stew
Beef wasn’t on the menu for cowboys as often as you’d expect – a lot of meals were based on bacon or salt pork.
Not every cow would survive a drive though, and injured animals often had to be shot.
When they were, the meat wouldn’t go to waste.
Usually it would end up in a simple but filling stew along with onions and root vegetables, which were rugged enough to survive in the chuck wagon.
Ingredients:
- 2 pounds beef
- 2 pounds potatoes, diced
- 1 pound carrots, sliced
- 1-2 large onions, chopped
- 1 15 oz can chopped tomatoes (optional)
- 1 tsp salt
Brown the beef in the Dutch oven with a little oil. Add the onions and sauté for a minute or two. Add the carrots, potatoes and salt (and tomatoes, if you have them). Cover with cold water, put the lid on, scoop embers on top and leave it in the edge of the fire for an hour. Stir well and serve.
It’s not easy to have access to fresh vegetables, especially during a crisis. I learned from here how to grow a year-round, self-sustaining garden because you can never be too certain of what is next. I definitely don’t want to be at the mercy of others when it comes to my food sources.
Chili
There were times in the history of the Old West when up to a third of cowboys were Mexican. When they came to work on US ranches they brought their recipes with them, and chili quickly became a favorite.
Tasty, but easy to make with the basic ingredients cowboys had available, it was a popular choice when an injured cow had to be slaughtered on the trail. It’s also a one-pot meal, ideal for cooking in a Dutch oven.
Cowboys would add any extra vegetables they could get their hands on, often including corn.
Ingredients:
- 2 pounds ground beef
- 25 cups dried beans
- 1 tbsp molasses
- 1 tsp salt
- Ground, crushed or fresh chili peppers to taste
- 1-2 large onions, chopped
- 2-3 bell peppers, chopped (optional)
- 1 pound tomatoes or one 15 oz can chopped tomatoes (optional)
Soak the beans for at least eight hours, then drain and throw away the water. Put a splash of oil in the Dutch oven, heat it, then brown the beef.
I used this guide to can my own ground beef, ensuring I have a reliable supply stored in my root cellar. While most people rely on their freezer for ground beef, I don’t want to risk it spoiling during an extended blackout. And in these uncertain times, daily trips to the store for ingredients aren’t something I can count on.
After browning the beef, add in the onions and sauté a minute or two. Add the peppers if you have them, sauté for another minute.
Add the beans and enough cold water to cover them. Stir in the molasses, salt and chili, and the tomatoes if you have them. Bring to the boil, then move to the edge of the fire, put the lid on and scoop embers on top. Leave to cook for an hour, then stir well and serve.
Cornbread
Cowboys would take fresh bread with them on the trail, but a couple of days out from the ranch that was usually all gone.
The rest of the way, if they wanted something to dip in their stew they had to make it themselves. Usually that meant cornbread – and a Dutch oven is perfect for baking it.
Ingredients:
- 2 cups cornmeal
- 15 oz canned creamed corn
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 5 tsp baking soda
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk mixed with 1 tsp white vinegar)
- 2 large eggs
- 1 oz butter
Whisk the eggs in a bowl. Stir in the buttermilk and corn. Add all the other ingredients except the butter, and mix until smooth. Melt the butter in the Dutch oven.
Add the cornbread mix, put the lid on the Dutch oven and set it in the edge of the fire. Scoop embers onto the lid. Turn the oven a quarter turn every five or ten minutes to bake the bread evenly. It’s ready when a knife or toothpick pushed into the cornbread comes out clean (about 30 minutes).
Sourdough Biscuits
Sometimes cowboys would get cornmeal in their supplies; sometimes they got flour.
If the chuck wagon was loaded with flour they’d make up a few jars of sourdough starter and take them along.
As well as bread, it could be used to bake these tasty sourdough biscuits.
Ingredients:
- 4 cups flour
- 1 cup sourdough starter
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 oz shortening
Put half the flour in a bowl and mix in the sourdough starter. Add the other dry ingredients. Mix in more flour until you have a firm dough. Divide it into balls.
Melt the shortening and roll the balls in it. Then flatten them slightly, put them in the Dutch oven and let the rise for 20 minutes. Move the Dutch oven to the edge of the fire and scoop embers on top. Turn it every five minutes to bake the biscuits evenly. They’ll be ready in about 30 minutes.
None of these recipes need complicated equipment or ingredients, but they’re all tasty, filling and will keep you going when you need the energy. They worked for our ancestors in the Old West, and they work just as well for preppers now.
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I have been cooking with cast iron for a long time, don’t care for those Chinese Teflon pans. Have bought a Dutch Oven many years ago still in the box up in the attic for the day of the SHTF time.
This article is getting me interested in breaking out the Dutch an try one of the recipes here.
I did buy a tripod for cooking on an open campfire. I still have a gas stove so might try it on the stove first. The bureaucrats haven’t taken my gas stove yet, the wacked out bums think it will global climate change baloney. Tired of the idiots in charge.
May try the chili recipe first, YUM!
CHILI with 25 cups of dry beans! NO. I assume it to be 2 1/2 cups dry beans!
maybe…..
I read it wrong???
I was thinking the same thing!
Chili – the “real, western kind” does NOT have beans in it. Sure, you can add beans, but it isn’t chili then…
Funny thing about cowboys and old west cooking, get a hankering for watching old cowboy movies when either party has their dam televised convention political campaign going on. Maybe we should have the main leader and the subordinates face off in a drawdown who ever is left standing takes the job as the new Sherriff in town.
Anyways this is a great food article making me hungry to try out the recipes.
God bless America.
Very useful article.Information we can all learn from.
Dutch oven spuds and onions in our deer camp every
year.
In regards to the article on Dutch Ovens and Cowboys, in contrast to Cowboys and preppers. Do you think in today’s lifestyles most preppers along those lines are like the Cowboys then liken to the Mountain Man lifestyle. As even the hardcore grizzly guy in the old west still had to trade and get supplies for living in the wilds.
Todays preppers maybe considered the cowboys of the day and the true survivalist-prepper living would be the ones living off the grid.
So far does that analogy work as far as we learn from the past history to what we are going through in today’s time?
When it comes down to it, no matter how much we are prepped we will eventually need to resupply at the general store. We can’t just live on foraging food forever eventually those plants will be eaten up by the local population.
While we are foraging for food their are many doing the same thing to survive. Even back then in the old west lifestyle people still needed to have manufactured items to live. Think being a prepper is a good practice and learning skills but in the long run, these are temporary measures.
We have seen the TV series of ALONE and know there is a certain point to survival we will face in the future.
In the meantime lets try out these recipes, looking delicious and tasty.
Soak 2 cups of pinto beans in water for 8 hours, no more no less. Get a good bed of mesquite coals going in your firepit, hang your Dutch Oven from a tripod over the fire. Chop 4 slices bacon, sautee in a bit of lard. Chop a sweet onion and 2-3 jalapenos, sautee in the bacon grease with black pepper, garlic powder, cumin, paprika, and salt, then add enough of the water or broth you’re going to cook the beans in to deglaze the pan, then add the beans and cover with at least an inch of liquid, also 16oz of the best tomato sauce you can get. Cook uncovered adding liquid as the beans soak it up, you’ll have to manage the fire and cooking height for several hours, but the reward is fresh delicious beans with a great mesquite smoke flavor, the meal that won the west.
One of my favorite movie scenes is John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn in the original True Grit shoveling pinto beans into his face, oversized spoon clinched in his big fist, jug of corn whiskey handy to wash it all down.
There’s no beans in Chili!
Question, over the years about beans or no beans in chili, is this a Texas no, no?
What was the original chili recipe invented or created at?
Did the chili recipes have a split in whether to use beans or no beans, like in different regions of America there are different versions of Barbeque, the preferences of the sauce applied to the meat.
Is chili an old world recipe or a new version of some old world chili like recipe adapted in Texas?
What is the true history of chili, I’m getting hungry to try both versions an see for myself which one I prefer.
Happy trails and God bless
The earliest American chili was made by Southwestern Indians, it was meat slow cooked with the native chili pepper, chili pequin. This is often called Tinga in New Mexico. Hot hot hot but delicious. Early travelers in Texas like Rip Ford and Frederick Law Olmstead encountered a fiery chili in the Mexican cow camps that was just beans cooked with chili pequin, enjoyed with corn tortillas.
Nobody much cared about chili until 1967 when Carrol Shelby, Jim Hall, and Frank X. Tolbert, with the aid of a lot of Tequila, had a chili cooking contest at Tolbert’s Terlingua Store in Terlingua, Texas. One of the 1st rules was meat no beans, and the argument continues to this day. Have to say, I no longer travel north of Red River but I remember having some pretty tasty meat and bean chili up north where the sun only weakly shines, but wouldn’t dream of making it that way.
I like the whole shootin match or mix of both meat, beans and peppers regardless of the made up inspired Tequila chili cook off. Meat and beans taste great and some not all added hot peppers and spices. YUM, YUM, YUM!
Brisket and beans make a mighty tasty taco.
When to add beans to chili, it makes it chili con Carney
Uhhhh … No.
Carne means “meat”. Chile can carne means chile with meat. My great grandmother, who was wealthy from rural Jalisco, called chile with beans only “chile con frijoles”. If meat instead of beans, “chile con carne”. If both meat AND beans, “chile con carne con frijoles”.
“Chili” is gringo Texas. “Chile” is Spanish and refers to chile peppers. Because the saucy part of chili is made of ground chiles, The term also applies to that sauce.
The beans used in chlii vary widely depending on who is making it. There are regional tendencies. There are also regional tendencies as to which sort of pepper is used, but again is largely subject to the cook’s preference.
Meat used is also variable. From beef to chicken to pork to goat and all the various parts of each type of animal.
Former Chili Cookoff event judge here.
Also attendant of Carroll Shelby’s Chli Cookoff events at Tropico Gold Mine here in the Mojave Desert of So Cal between the town of Rosamund and Willow Springs Raceway, Willow Springs is one of the race tracks that Shelby used for testing his race cars and is seen in the Ford v. Ferrari movie when “Ken Miles” is having a tantrum about the theoretical luggage fitting under the trunk lid of a car body that had been competing in events for nearly a decade and he attacks the trunk lid of his race car with a hammer to make clearance. That happened in Europe actually when the French officials were trying to keep an American Upstart group from making the Europeans look bad.
As I grew up involved in that racing in that era and knew Shelby, Miles and Hall personally, I’m familiar with that stuff too.
Thank you John Savage! REAL Chili has NO BEANS!!!
Please tell me that is a typo in the first recipe. 25 cups of dried beans equates to about 75 cups of cooked beans!
And, John Savage; yes, yes there is…. 🙂
That is a very large Dutch oven. I have never seen or heard of one that big.
the first recipe calls for 25 cups of navy beans that sounds like a lot for one Dutch oven??
Didn’t you mean 2and a half cups beans? 25 cups is far too many. I have noticed several of your articles with some serious typo’s. You need a proofreader.
Agree, most recipes I’ve seen use 2-3 Cups, or 1 pound.
This website also needs an edit button to fix the errors, thank you.
I don’t think on a long cattle drive they would make corn bread. Maybe when close to towns or farms where they could get eggs and milk. I believe they would make hot water corn bread.
Early Texas homesteaders lived off pork and that poor quality hot water cornbread. The Vaqueros packed nixtamalized corn flour, Masa Harina, much better taste and nutrition, you just mix it with water, pat out a few tortillas, toast lightly, and dig into those beans.
Have to wonder how many camp cooks actually packed sourdough starter out on the range just for biscuits.
Why are the amounts of beans so large? I mean, 25 cups dried beans is way too much. Can you edit the recipes for those of us who would like to use them?
Eastern chilli has beans. Western chilli has meat and chilli peppers.
You need a proofreader. I have been an editor for 25 years fort an international human resources company. I’m for hire at $45 per hour.
@MaryNolte, you did not proof your own comment…..shame on you!! You might command $7.25 an hour now!!
This comment section needs an edit button, thanks.
Like the recipe 25 cups instead of 2.5 cups, you mean $4.50, not $45 per hour, living wage?
Tired of unionized non-trade skilled burger flippers wanting $20+ bucks an hour for a living wage, these jobs are only a minimum wage to gain basic work skills.
Not to feed a family of four. This is why the teachers unionized education fails to teach the basics, especially basic economics and math.
Unions ask for higher wages which businesses must increase prices to compensate for higher wages.
This in turn makes us fixed income seniors spend more money we don’t have.
Everyone wants to unionize so they can get higher wages which a myth.
Like healthcare workers on strike who the heck is taking care of the patients in the hospital?
The real people who make bank are the union bosses that cash in, ever look at their bottom line income?
Us retirees barely get a reasonable COLA for social security and Medicare. But these liberal commies in Washington DC and Demoncrat run states give away taxpayer’s money to the illegals.
It all bankrupts our social security and Medicare systems we depend on that the bureaucrats started in the first place.
Thank you so much! This is one of your best articles to date.
God Bless You!