three bean chili
(vegan with vegetarian options)

recipe by mb

just the recipe

what I was looking for

I love making chili. I make it in giant batches and then freeze it so that the hubby and I can have food readily available that's easy and isn't just ordered from our local Chinese or pizza place. I guess I like to plan ahead for our laziness.

When I saw that our book of the month had a recipe for chili, I knew I had to make it. I thought that Molly and Walt's recipe would be simple and fast and delicious. But as I scanned through it I found that my usual way of making chili had a big leg up on their recipe, so I figured I had to share.

what I made

Mollie Katzen and Walt Willett's recipe for 3-bean chili from Eat, Drink, and Weigh Less (pg. 211) but alteRed so that it's even simpler and healthier and easier.

grades for my version

healthy	A	This is a ridiculously healthy dish, all filled with veggies and healthy protein and spices. Perfect.
fast	C	The way I make it chili takes all day.
easy	A	There is, quite literally, almost nothing to do for this recipe. It couldn't be easier.
cheap	A	Vegetables, canned beans, and spices. Cheap to the max.
delicious	A	This was a particularly good batch of chili, if I do say so myself.

yield

Served three for dinner (Darwin LOVES chili) and made two freezer containers full, about nine servings altogether.

special equipment

   a crockpot

Now, I need to give a big shout-out to my friend Jannelle here. If it wasn't for her I'm not sure I would have ever come up with the idea of putting squashes into chili. Her husband was doing Weight Watchers and zucchini counts as no points, so Jannelle started putting zucchini into everything. After Darwin was born she brought us a bunch of food, which all had zucchini in it, and I was intrigued. Under the right circumstances zucchini can add nutritional content and you can't even taste it! I started slipping it into dishes and seeing if J noticed. The answer was inevitably no, so I just kept putting it into everything. But this, this is the crowning jewel of the zucchini-hiding mission. In chili you don't even know it's there. It simply adds bulk and nutrition without taking away from the flavor at all. It's genius, if I do say so myself.

And, just so you guys know, I'm giving you instructions for how to make my version of chili, which is the simplest recipe on the face of the planet. Walt and Mollie's recipe involves many steps (frying vegetables, sautéing spices, bringing things to a boil, etc.), but mine involves three: cutting up vegetables, putting everything into a crockpot, and stirring.

It's the soul of simplicity.

the veggies to cut up

ingredients	M+W	mb	why?
olive oil	2 Tablespoons	---	not needed [1]
onion	1½ cups small-diced	1½ cups large-diced	easier
bell peppers	1 cup, diced	1 cup, diced	no change
zucchini	---	1 medium, diced	healthier
yellow squash	---	1 medium, diced	healthier
Notes
[1]	If you cook your chili in a crock pot then you don't need to add any fat because all the veggies stew together instead of needing to be fried.

Start early in the morning, because you want to give this chili a good long time to cook in the crockpot.

Chop up the onion, peppers, zucchini, and yellow squash. Toss them into the crockpot.

the flavorings

ingredients	M+W	mb	why?
garlic	1 Tablespoon crushed	2 Tablespoons crushed	healthier
chili powder	2 Tablespoons	3 Tablespoons	tastier [1]
ground cumin	2 teaspoons	---	easier
dried oregano	1 teaspoon	---	tastier [2]
dried basil	1 teaspoon	---	tastier [2]
cayenne pepper	big pinch	---	tastier [3]
black pepper	to taste	---	easier
Notes
[1]	The zucchini and yellow squash add a lot more bulk to the chili, so you need some extra chili powder.
[2]	Now maybe I'm crazy, but oregano and basil are Italian spices in my mind, and so have absolutely no place in a pot of chili.
[3]	Like I said, Darwin loves chili, which means no spiciness at all. For now.

Crush the garlic right into the crockpot and add the chili powder.

the canned goods

ingredients	M+W	mb	why?
crushed tomatoes	1 28 oz. can	---	tastier [1]
diced tomatoes	1 15 oz. can	1 15 oz. can	no change
vegetable broth	1 cup	---	not needed [2]
black beans	1 15 oz. can	1 15 oz. can	no change
kidney beans	1 15 oz. can	1 15 oz. can	no change
garbanzo beans	1 15 oz. can	1 15 oz. can	no change
Notes
[1]	A theme in my cooking: I love tomatoes, J hates them. Ah the things we do for love.
[2]	The zucchini and squash also add a lot of moisture, making vegetable broth a totally unnecessary ingredient.

Drain the 3 cans of beans and the diced tomatoes and toss them in.

All credit to Molly and Walt, I had never tried garbanzo beans in chili before and they turned out to be a marvelous addition, toothsome and meaty.

the secret ingredient

ingredients	M+W	mb	why?
salt	¼ teaspoon regular salt	1 teaspoon smoked Mexican salt or to taste	tastier [1]
Notes
[1]	This is my super secret chili ingredient, so you should all feel very special that I'm sharing it with you. The smokiness of the salt means that my chili ends up tasting like it was cooked over a fire on the open range in Montana.

Add the salt and stir thoroughly.

Now let the crockpot sit on low for 8-10 hours, coming back occasionally (I mean like every couple of hours) to stir it until you're ready to eat dinner.

Serve bowls of chili topped off with shredded cheese or sour cream (either of which would make the dish vegetarian rather than vegan) or chopped cilantro or whatever pleases your fancy, with a big piece of cornbread on the side.

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