Meaty Chile Con Queso Recipe

This queso is comfort food – recognizable, memory-conjuring, soul-satisfying, amazingly good. Dip a chip and revisit your childhood!

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 5

Cook Time 10

Servings: 8 - 10 generous servings (roughly ½ cup per serving) or up to 16 appetizer-sized portions

Cuisine: Tex-Mex

1 10 oz. can of Rotel tomatoes and green chiles: mild, hot or other variation based on your preference (see note)
1 lb. Velveeta cheese or other ‘processed cheese food’, AKA ‘American cheese’, cut into 1-inch cubes
2 cups Frank’s Chili or your favorite chili (see note)

Optional add-ins or garnishes

Get Recipe Ingredients

Put the cubed cheese and the can of tomatoes and green chiles (with the juice / not drained) in a microwave-safe bowl and set the heat to melt based on the strength of your microwave. (Mine is a high-powered microwave and I set it at Power 4 for 3 minutes, then stirred, then set it for 3 more minutes.) Continue to heat until the cheese is fully melted and the can of tomatoes and green chiles is fully integrated.
Add the chili and stir well, and then heat until the queso is the right temperature to serve. In my microwave, it was another 3 minutes on Power 4, a quick stir, and then 30 seconds on High.
At this point, you can stir in the optional ingredients – all of them or just some of them – and/or top with your selections.

If you are outside of the US and/or don’t have access to Rotel tomatoes, you can substitute 7 oz. diced tomatoes and their juice and 3 oz. diced green chiles.
This recipe was created by my Dad, Frank Harvell, as a wonderful way to use leftovers of his chili, although it’s so good that leftovers were rare and there’s a family story about my brother taking more than his share when we had guests… that’s a story called “Don’t Eat All the Chili” in the blog post with the Frank’s Chili recipe.
You can use your own favorite chili! Dad’s recipe is a no-beans chili recipe, and it’s really, really good in this queso recipe. My own chili recipe has tons of beans (3 kinds!), and is also good with this queso. You might want to use your own chili, or even a can of store-bought chili. It’s ok!
You can make a vegetarian version of this Meaty Chili Con Queso recipe by simply using your vegetarian chili. Go for it!
You could also use Chicken Chili.
In other words, this is a FLEX recipe (my favorite kind).