Chili cheese fries are nothing if not decadent. The meal begins with hot and crispy fries, then is topped with rich chili and finished with the perfect amount of cheese.
The combo of flavors and textures is a delight to the senses, creating a distinctive meal that’s now become a staple of American cuisine, one you can find in countless fast food restaurants and diners. Then there are homemade chili cheese fries, which are even better and allow you to experiment with ingredients and flavor combos (and seriously, isn’t homemade food always tastier?).
One big challenge is deciding what to serve with chili cheese fries. After all, this is a rich and complex meal all on its own. What sides could you choose to elevate it?
Notably, you’re looking for light and vibrant dishes that offer an interesting flavor contrast while cutting through some of the grease of the main dish. Thankfully, there are plenty options out there. The best sides for chili cheese fries include a salad, pickles, guacamole, coleslaw, and salsa, which all fit those features and are also flavorful in their own right.
What To Serve With Chili Cheese Fries (13 Sides To Try)
A Salad
Chili cheese fries are packed with grease and protein. They’re almost a complete meal, except that there’s no greens.
A salad is the perfect solution to that problem. Not only does it provide plenty of greens, but you’re also getting an acidic salad dressing that helps cut through all the fat.
Serving a contrasting side like salad is perfect for another reason too – it creates variation. This gets around the issue of palate fatigue, where you are less sensitive to different flavors if your meal doesn’t have much variation. By eating salad with your chili cheese fries, you balance the meal and can enjoy all the flavors for much longer.
Serving a salad also makes your meal a little healthier. It’s not healthy, by any means. Still, at least a salad offsets a little of that grease.
Carrot Salad With Garlic
Instead of serving a regular salad, why not try this Carrot Salad with Garlic? Using grated carrot as the base provides more color and flavor than normal, creating a refreshing recipe.
This carrot salad might seem a little different, as it doesn’t include any raisins. Most of the salad simply consists of carrots, plus onion and garlic, where the onion and garlic have been cooked and caramelized to create an amazing flavor profile.
Then, there’s a dressing that relies on olive oil, sugar, salt, and vinegar. There are a few other ingredients as well, which combine to create a salad that’s both wonderful and simple.
Pickles
If you don’t want a full salad, what about serving pickles instead? They provide an excellent contrasting flavor, without too much heaviness.
The acidity of pickles is perhaps their most powerful feature. This helps to cut through the richness of the chili and cheese while also cleansing your palate. Plus, you get an interesting texture contrast between the pickles and your chili cheese fries.
You don’t need to stop with regular pickles either. Any type of pickled vegetable could work well here, including pickled carrots, pickled beets, and pickled radishes. For even more variation, you could try adding some herbs or spices, such as garlic, dill, peppercorns, fennel seeds, bay leaves, or even ginger.
Jalapeños Garlic Basil Pickles
These Jalapeño Garlic Basil Pickles are the perfect alternative to regular pickles. The combination of basil, garlic, and jalapeños is a perfect way to add more flavor to pickles.
Basil is the most unusual addition here, but it’s also a fantastic one. It provides interesting herbal flavor notes that work well with all the other ingredients.
If you’re not a fan of regular pickles, you could easily use the same flavoring ingredients to pickle a different type of vegetable. Whichever you choose, you’ll get a delicious side that contrasts your chili cheese fries.
Avocado
Avocado is another simple addition to consider. This could be as easy as slicing an avocado and serving it on top of your chili cheese fries.
Or, you could go to a little more effort and make some guacamole instead? This uses lime juice and a few extra ingredients to boost the flavor of your avocado and make it even more exciting.
You could serve the guacamole as a side and perhaps dip your chili cheese fries in it. Or, you might simply add the guacamole on top of your fries. Doing so makes your entire meal look stunning and adds an interesting flavor contrast.
Spicy Mango Guacamole
This Spicy Mango Guacamole is a stylish alternative to regular guacamole. The recipe features chopped mango, red onions, and jalapeno peppers – plus plenty of avocado.
The mango is a fantastic addition, providing a bright color and just the right amount of sweetness. Then there’s the jalapenos, which add a layer of spice that brings all the other flavors together.
If you’re not a fan of heat, simply leave the jalapenos out. The other ingredients will still work well together and the guacamole remains much more interesting than normal.
Beer
Chili cheese fries are pretty rich and filling on their own, so you don’t really need a dedicated side or extra topping. But, instead of serving nothing at all, why not pair your chili cheese fries with a cold beer?
The carbonation in your beer cuts through some of the intensity of the chili cheese fries. You get a nice temperature contrast too, which is perfect if your chili is a bit spicy.
Beergaritas
These Beergaritas are a delicious and easy beer-based cocktail. They also live up to their name, as they’re simply a combination of a margarita and beer.
The recipe author recommends using Corona Light or Modelo Especial as the beer of choice for these cocktails. The flavor profile of Corona Light works particularly well, plus this is an inexpensive type of beer that’s very easy to find.
Of course, you can easily experiment and use whatever beer you have on hand. You could even make these cocktails with more intensely flavored beer, like an IPA. Doing so would change the flavor profile considerably, but the new version might taste even better.
Pickled Jalapeños And Sour Cream
We talked about pickles earlier, but the combo of pickled jalapeños and sour cream deserves a special mention. Here, the jalapeños cut through the richness of the main meal, while the sour cream adds the perfect amount of creaminess.
The addition makes sense anyway, as sour cream is a natural choice for pairing with chili cheese fries. Why not give the combo a try?
Easy Homemade Pickled Jalapeños
If you haven’t made pickled jalapeños before, then these Easy Homemade Pickled Jalapeños are the perfect place to begin. The pickling process adds some exciting flavors to jalapenos without removing their natural taste and nuances.
This is a quick pickling recipe, so it uses vinegar as an ingredient. The vinegar means the pickles are ready to eat within 24 hours (you could even eat them sooner if you really want to). But, they won’t last as long as fermented pickles and need to be stored in the fridge.
Coleslaw
While we’ve already talked about salads, coleslaw deserves a special mention. Most versions include a creamy dressing, which creates a delicious cool contrast between the salad and your fries.
There are often tangy notes in the dressing too – creating the flavor contrast we talked about earlier.
And, once again, there’s a ton of chances for variation. You can experiment with the flavors of the dressing or the ingredients in the salad itself. Some versions even skip the creaminess and use a vinaigrette-based dressing instead. There are plenty of possible mix-ins too like apple pieces or walnuts. These provide extra flavor and often a texture contrast too.
Easy No Mayo Taco Slaw
This Easy No Mayo Taco Slaw is an interesting coleslaw variation. It’s a creamy salad, but there is no mayo present at all. There aren’t any dairy ingredients either, making this a great vegan recipe.
The salad hosts one crucial hidden ingredient – avocado. This adds a delicious flavor, while also making the salad much creamier. Because of the avocado, it’s best to make this salad right before you need it. After all, avocados brown quickly, so the salad won’t look or taste that good even half a day after you first prepared it.
Fried Green Tomatoes
Like pickles, fried green tomatoes offer a tangy contrast to the richness of your chili cheese fries. They’re also a little more interesting than pickles, as there’s a texture contrast between the juicy interior of the tomatoes and the crisp breading on the outside.
The tricky thing is finding green tomatoes to begin with. Some grocery stores stock them, but most focus on ripe or almost ripe tomatoes instead. You might have more luck at a Mexican store. Otherwise, the best source is your own garden (or, perhaps the garden of a neighbor).
Vegan Fried Green Tomatoes
Fried green tomatoes aren’t traditionally vegan, as their batter often includes eggs or buttermilk. However, there are alternatives, like these Vegan Fried Green Tomatoes. The recipe uses almond milk instead of buttermilk, plus plenty of interesting ingredients for flavor.
The tomatoes can be cooked in two ways – on the stovetop or in an air fryer. Both approaches create delicious and flavorful fried green tomatoes.
There are also details for making a vegan remoulade dipping sauce. This dipping sauce probably isn’t relevant alongside chili cheese fries, but you could always make it another time.
Salsa
Now we come to salsa. This has the same vibrant contrast that we’ve seen in a few different sides so far. The acidic notes in the tomatoes and lime juice are crucial for cutting through the rich fattiness of your chili cheese fries.
You could serve salsa as a side dish and dip your fries in it before eating them. Or, you might simply dollop some salsa on top of the chili cheese fries.
Beyond this, salsa is a very easy side. You could even simply buy salsa from the store instead of making your own (of course, the homemade version is so much better).
Mango Avocado Salsa
Making your own salsa allows you to experiment with the ingredients, like using different types of fruit or changing the flavoring ingredients. This Mango Avocado Salsa is a great example of the idea.
The salsa is a spicy-sweet recipe that relies on mangos, avocado, green peppers, and red onion to form its body. The peppers give the recipe its spice, so you can swap these for a milder option or even just use green bell peppers instead.
The use of mango instead of tomatoes changes the flavor of the salsa considerably. Yet, you still get a refreshing contrasting flavor that’s perfect alongside your chili cheese fries.
Sliced Steak
Here’s an interesting idea, why not add some sliced steak on top of your chili cheese fries? This is an excellent idea if you want the meal to be even more satisfying.
Steak also offers some different flavors and a varied texture compared to the chili mixture on top of your fries. This is a powerful effect as well and makes the whole meal better.
There’s plenty of room for experimentation here (as always!). For example, you could try different cuts of steak or perhaps season your steak in creative ways.
Carne Asada
Carne Asada is one of the best types of steak to serve with chili cheese fries, as it is tender with a delicious smoky flavor. This particular version uses garlic, citrus, and jalapenos as the main flavor ingredients. These work together perfectly and create a stunning approach to steak.
Now imagine pairing all of those amazing flavors with chili cheese fries. Wouldn’t that create a stunning dish? And, don’t worry – carne asada isn’t difficult to prepare at all. You might even find that you start making this at home regularly.
Sorbet
Instead of serving a dish next to your chili cheese fries, why not look for a refreshing dessert instead? Sorbet is tough to beat, as it is light, vibrant, and tangy. There’s also a stunning contrast between your hot meal and cool dessert.
Sorbet comes in endless flavors, including citrus, berry, tropical, and stone fruit versions. Then there are the more surprising styles, like chocolate, coffee, or even chili-mango sorbet.
You can make your own sorbet at home or simply buy some. The store-bought versions are surprisingly good and are an easy way to reduce your workload.
3-Ingredient Lemon Sorbet
If you want to make sorbet yourself, this 3-Ingredient Lemon Sorbet is the recipe you need. It simply relies on lemons, sugar, and water, giving you an incredibly vibrant dessert.
The recipe includes details for varying the flavors as well, in case you want something more complex. For example, you might add chopped basil or top the sorbet with strawberry puree. Once you’re familiar with the process, you might even create your own unique sorbet flavors.
Cucumber Salad
Cucumber is one of the most refreshing vegetables, so it’s no surprise that cucumber salad ends up being very refreshing as well. You even get a cooling effect from the cucumbers. That’s excellent next to the richness of your chili cheese fries.
This cooling effect is even more powerful if your chili cheese fries have a little spice to them.
The salad usually relies on cucumber as the main ingredient, plus just a few extras. For example, you might include herbs and spices for extra flavor. You could add some chopped red onion as well, for color and texture.
You can even choose between a creamy dressing for the salad or a vinaigrette-based one. The creamy dressing gives you even more coolness, while the vinaigrette-based one offers contrasting tanginess instead.
Cucumber Dill Salad With Dill Vinaigrette
This Cucumber Dill Salad with Dill Vinaigrette gives you some of the flavors of pickles in a completely different form. English cucumbers and red onion form the base of the salad. They’re then complemented by a light dressing that includes olive oil, dill, vinegar, and dijon mustard.
The ingredients in the dressing ensure it packs a flavor punch, without completely overpowering the cucumber. It’s easy to see how this combo works well alongside chili cheese fries. Even a bite or two would completely refresh your palate.
If you want a creamy cucumber salad instead, no worries. You can simply mix mayo into the dressing to create a creamy version.
Onion Rings
Onion rings are a little odd as a side, given they’re crispy and deep fried, just like your fries. Yet, sometimes doubling up on textures like this can be perfect – especially if you’re in the mood for something decadent.
Besides, while onion rings are similar to fries, they’re not exactly the same. This makes onion rings a fun way to mix up your meal. You could even experiment with herbs and spices to make your onion rings stand out even more.
Blooming Onion With Dipping Sauce
Why serve regular onion rings when you can choose a Blooming Onion with Dipping Sauce instead? The onion has been deep fried to perfection, with a perfect dipping sauce and spices in the breading to boost the flavor profile.
The trick is to carefully cut a whole onion to get a blossom shape, then double bread the onion to make it as crispy as possible. You end up with a fantastic appetizer or side that works with countless mains (or you could just eat the onion on its own).
A Burger
Finally, there’s the option of serving a full burger alongside your chili cheese fries, as the flavors work together so well. This might sound like too much, but that’s only true if you have a large serving of chili cheese fries with your burger.
The trick is to change the serving sizes. So, if you’re focusing on a filling burger, you’ll need a much smaller serving of chili cheese fries. Essentially, the fries become your side, while the burger is the main dish.
Doing so opens up a world of possibilities, given there are so many types of burgers. Vegetable-heavy burgers are a stunning option here, given there is plenty of meat and cheese on your fries.
Bacon Jam Burgers
Aren’t these Bacon Jam Burgers incredible? Their selling feature is a delicious bacon bourbon jam, which is packed with flavor and makes the burger stand out.
Complementing this jam is delicious sriracha mayo. This adds even more flavor and mild heat. Of course, you could easily sub this out for another type of mayo or plain mayo if you wish.
For that matter, the bacon bourbon jam is really the only essential part of the recipe. You could change the type of burger buns, the patty, the cheese, or anything else – to create your own perfect meal.
Substitutes For Ground Ginger