Crockpot Quinoa Chili {Recipe}

I love Pinterest. It is such a great inspirational site and I have pinned many, many things already… most of which I will probably never make.

That said, I pinned a quinoa chili recipe the other day and was eager to actually make it. I still hadn’t figured out what I would be serving for dinner that night, but after realizing that I didn’t have all of the ingredients needed, the recipe ended up in the “to be made later” file. Fast forward two days {a long time, I know} and I had to go grocery shopping. I remembered the recipe {clever that I was, I had already printed it 2 days earlier} checked the cupboard one last time and my shopping list was finished.

The original Quinoa Chili recipe on the Savvyvegitarian.com looked great, but it included a few things that 1) I don’t care for and 2) just couldn’t find. So I tweaked the recipe and everything was in the crockpot and ready to cook shortly after getting home. It had to cook at least 5 hours, and with each passing hour the house started to smell better and better. By the time Ray got home from work, my stomach was yelling at me because everything smelled so tasty and I was ready to dig in… and boy did I ever!

Since everything turned out so well, I thought I would share my version of the recipe…

Crockpot Quinoa Chili

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup uncooked quinoa
• 3 cups water
• 1 can kidney beans (drained and rinsed)
• 1 can black beans (drained and rinsed)
• 1 can diced tomatoes with chili’s (Rotel)
• 1 cup unsalted tomato sauce
• 1/2 Tbsp olive oil
• 1/4 cup chopped onion
• 1 Tbsp (2 – 3 cloves) minced garlic
• 1/2 red bell pepper, diced

• 1 tsp cumin powder
• 2 tsp gr coriander
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp dried basil leaf
• 1/2 tsp dried ground thyme leaf
• 1/2 tsp dried ground marjoram leaf
• 1/8 – 1/4 tsp chili powder (add more to heat it up more)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 Tbsp molasses

• chopped cilantro
• sour cream
• cheddar cheese
• oyster crackers or saltines
• Fresh ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

• Using a 6 qt crockpot (slow cooker), combine all ingredients except for the molasses and garnish ingredients. Stir well for 2 minutes.
• Cover and cook on low for 5-6 hours.
• Add molasses before serving.
• Garnish with desired toppings (in our house it was cheese and crackers)

The original recipe called for celery and green bell peppers to be added… both of which I’m not a big fan of {though I know that the celery would have gone unnoticed once everything was cooked up, I still decided to leave it out of my version}, so I  left those out. It also only called for tomato sauce {and 2 Tbs chopped jalapeno’s}, I decided that I wanted to have a little more tomato in it, so I added the can of diced tomatoes and chili’s {Rotel or something similar}.

I have to say that although Ray wrinkled his nose at the thought of having meatless chili, even he was smiling afterwards and said how good it tasted. I will be replacing my old veggie chili recipe for this one! It really was delicious, with just the right amount of beans and of “heat”. I ate it again for lunch the following day, and I think it was even better than the night before!! I had enough chili for about 5 plates filled the way that you see them shown… it’s a recipe that I would love to double, but can’t because we don’t have a large enough crockpot…. so yes, it’s that good!

If you made this, I’d love to hear from you and see what you thought of it… did you leave the recipe as is and if not, what changes did you make?