So one morning a few weeks ago I rolled on downstairs and dumped a bunch of ingredients in the crock pot, turned it on low for 8 hours, and walked out the door (a total of two minutes prep time, tops). The rest of the day I calculated how long it would take me to prepare dinner option B later that evening, as I was convinced Dave would surely arrive home to an unsalvageable broth filled with half raw chicken and partially defrosted vegetables. To our great surprise, come dinner time there was a delicious, creamy, wonderful, warm pot of chicken pot pie stew waiting for us. "How long did it take you to shred up the chicken when you got home?" I asked Dave suspiciously (there had to be a catch, right???). "Ummm....two minutes? It was basically already shredded in there" came his response. Suddenly the clouds parted, angels started singing, birds started chirping, and a giant rainbow sprouted up through our kitchen floor. It worked. It really worked! I was astonished. Again, it wasn't a mystery to me how slow cookers work but I just couldn't believe it. It was as if a tiny little chef had broken into our house and prepared dinner, cleaned up all the pots and utensils, and left it warming for us. What's more? We had dinner for the next night too! And thus began my love affair with our crock pot.
Since that day we have enjoyed a slew of wonderful slow cooker recipes (including our doctored recipe for chicken pot pie that I will post here soon), but yesterday we enjoyed our favorite concoction yet - and it gets bonus points for being chock full of veggies. It's the perfect combo of spicy warmth and fall sweetness and I can't wait to get home tonight to enjoy the leftovers. Enjoy!
Pumpkin and Black Bean Chili
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 5-6 hours on low (in a 6.5 quart slow cooker - adjust time up or down depending on time of your cooker)
Servings: 4-6 depending on serving size - I won't lie, it's delicious so we each had a big bowl but you could stretch this to six smaller servings
Disclaimer: We are huge fans of Trader Joe's and prefer to buy organic when possible/not insanely more expensive than non-organic, but that is more of a personal preference than a necessity for the recipe, with the exception of the *taco seasoning (see note below)
Ingredients
1 medium red onion
1 medium red pepper
1 medium orange pepper
1 medium yellow pepper
1 - 15 oz. package of power greens or baby spinach (we use a baby spinach, kale, and chard blend)
1 bunch of scallions (optional)
2 to 6 cloves of garlic (depending on personal taste - we love garlic so we load it up!)
2- 15 oz. cans of organic pumpkin
2 -15 oz. cans of organic black beans (rinsed and drained)
1 quart (32 fl. oz.) of organic low-sodium vegetable stock
Low- Sour Cream or Greek Yogurt (optional)
A pinch or two of brown sugar (to taste- add more to balance the spice if you want a sweeter chili)
*1 package of taco seasoning
We love Trader Joe's taco seasoning as it doesn't have gross stabilizers or items we can't pronounce - (their spice mix includes sea salt, cumin, cayenne pepper, cane sugar, paprika, onion, garlic, black pepper, red bell pepper, oregano, chili pepper, and smoked paprika) if you can't find an all-natural mix, you can try your hand at seasoning with the above ingredients to taste OR try any other taco seasoning.
- Drizzle some olive oil in the bottom of your slow cooker pot
- Dice up onion (spoonable size or smaller if you prefer) and smash or press garlic, add to pot and mix
- Set slow cooker on high and cover - this will begin heating the onion and garlic and release their flavors while you prep the rest of the ingredients (5-10 minutes total)
- Rinse, seed, and slice up peppers (spoonable size or smaller if you prefer)
- Open cans of black beans, rinse and drain - set aside
- Open cans of pumpkin - set aside
- Remove cover from slow cooker stir onion and garlic
- Add canned pumpkin, scraping sides of can to get as much as possible out of the can
- Using whisk, begin whisking the pumpkin/onion/garlic mixture and slowly incorporate the vegetable stock, using about 3/4 of the container depending on preferred thickness
- Add the peppers and black beans to the pot
- Mix all ingredients together by stirring slowly
- Add 1/2 to full packet of taco seasoning to taste depending on spice preference (remember you can always add more but once it's in there, you can't take it out!)
- Set cooker on low for 5-6 hours on low, stirring once or twice throughout if you wish
- About an hour before serving, test the broth for the spice level - add a pinch or two of brown sugar, a bit more if too spicy to balance it out
- Fill bowls with a handful of baby spinach or power greens - don't worry about bowl looking too full, the hot liquid will wilt down the greens (NOTE: we add greens to just about every bowl of soup or chili we eat but we do NOT add the greens directly to the crock or soup pot because over cooking them reduces the nutrient content, plus it tends to get gross in leftovers)
- Ladle chili into bowls covering the greens and let sit for a minute (you may only need one ladle to start) - stir in the greens and top with more chili if needed and let sit another minute to wilt greens
- Top with diced scallions and a dollop of low fat sour cream or 0% greek yogurt (optional) and enjoy! We also make a batch of fresh cornbread and crumble a piece on top.
Nutritional Facts:Yummy? Healthy? Full o' veggies? Honestly it will vary a bit depending on how much olive oil and sugar you use, etc. but a quick non-official and unscientific input to a random online nutrition calculator yielded a nutrition report of roughly 450 calories, 3 grams of fat, 25 grams of fiber, and 26 grams of protein per serving (based on all ingredients and serving big bowls of chili to four people)
