Netflix and chili

Two announcements:

1. I got a slow cooker! My grandma stepped up and gave me one that I think is older than I am (so let’s hope it doesn’t malfunction and cause a death by Crock-Pot a la “This is Us”). None the less I was excited to start using it.

You know your Crock-Pot is old when these are the only options it has.

2. I have decided that in order to continue avoiding my fear of cooking meat instead of facing it, I am going to become a selective vegetarian. This means I’ll still sometimes cook myself chicken, and I’ll eat meat in a restaurant or if someone else cooked it, but I might not try cooking it myself for a little while. I’m pathetic I know, but lots of research says meat isn’t that great for you any ways so I’m fine with it.

For today’s recipe I decided to combine the two and make slow cooker vegetarian chili. It should also be noted that this is my first time cooking for the blog entirely by myself. That’s right, there was no one there to say “you can’t substitute that spice”, “you shouldn’t skip that step”, basically there was no one to fix my mistakes for me. So did it turn out? Let’s find out.

I adapted my recipe from The Endless Meal.

Slow cooker vegetarian chili

Ingredients

• 1 small onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, finely minced
• 2 tablespoons chili powder (more will be spicier)
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon basil
• 1 teaspoon chili flakes (the more chili flakes the spicier it will be)
• 1 red pepper, diced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 2 stalks of celery, diced
• 1– 28oz can of whole tomatoes and their juice (use your hands to roughly crush the tomatoes)
• 1 can of kidney beans, drained and rinsed
• Salt to taste

At 9:00 p.m. while watching “Jane the Virgin”, I prepped all the ingredients, except for the tomatoes and beans, and put them in a container in the fridge overnight. Then when I got up at 7:00 a.m. the next day I turned the slow-cooker on low and dumped it all in as well as the tomatoes and beans. I gave it a good stir and then left for a nine hour school day.

If you looked at the link to the recipe I was adapting from you’ve probably noticed a few problems already.

1. The recipe I was working from is not intended to be made in a slow cooker.
2. I did not sauté the onions and garlic and spices together to bring out their flavours.
3. I substituted basil for oregano (Liv Logic: they’re both green and dried, how different can they taste?”)
4. I have no idea how much salt I need.
5. I hate carrots so why would I like them in chili?

The verdict

When I got home from school starving and eager to taste my creation I was sad to see the carrots were still hard! So I turned the slow-cooker on high for two more hours to make them soft enough to eat. There was also a lot of liquid in the pot, I was hoping turning the slow cooker on high would make some of the liquid evaporate but it didn’t. When I finally tasted the chili it was okay. Not nearly spicy enough and it was more like a soup. I topped it with sour cream, grated cheese and a few pickled jalapeños which definitely improved the taste. It’s not as good as the meaty chili my dad makes, but I did eat it all even though it took me a whole week.

Later in the week I used some of the chili to make nachos. I laid down a bed of tortilla chips on a baking sheet, topped it with chili, grated cheese and pickled jalapeños and put it in the oven on broil for a few minutes until the cheese melted. I had to pick the carrots out for this meal because it was just too weird to me.

What I learned:

1. I’m not skilled enough to try and adapt recipes.
2. If you don’t like carrots just don’t cook with them, you’re gonna end up picking them out anyways.
3. Follow the instructions properly.
4. Old slow cookers need more time than you think to cook your food.

Despite this somewhat failure, I am not discouraged and the slow-cooker will be back! If you have any tried and true slow cooker recipes, let me know in the comments.