05.23-Spicy Smoky _Meaty_ Vegan Chili _ 1-Pot Meal! _ The Wicked Kitchen

Hello, welcome back to the Wicked Kitchen. Today, we are going to make a protein-packed vegan chili packed with flavor. And instead of meat, we're using some mushrooms in this, everyday mushrooms, super simple, one pot meal. Don't miss it. There you go. You gotta do that. Okay. Let's do it. Ready? Yeah, you go. All right, so this chili is packed with flavor, tons of heat. I love the heat in this chili. And it's similar to a chili con carne, but instead of using any kind of plant-based crumbles or plant-based sausages ground up, I'm gonna use mushrooms. So we're gonna grind these up to start off the dish. I like to pack in the beans into the chili. So I have black beans, pinto beans, and kidney beans. We're gonna pack in the protein. I'm gonna add some other veggies. This is an opportunity to load in the veggies. So I like to add even Brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes, even some broccoli and minced cauliflower into chili as well. You can pack in the veggies for your family. So let's get started with those mushrooms. So I just have some simple small portabellas, baby bellas, creminis. Okay, you can use white buttons, also works. I'm just giving these a chop because they're going right in the food processor. We're just gonna make a nice mince out of this. I like to chop them a little bit before going in the food processor because I want these all to be finely minced. I don't want half of it to be blended smooth and then there to be larger chunks in there. So you might be thinking, well, why the heck is he chopping these if they're going in the food processor? That is the reason. It's definitely to keep the consistent texture. All right, so these cook down quite a bit. Mushrooms are loaded with water, so these cook down quite a bit. All right, so we're gonna use the food processor. Just gonna add these in. Now, when I'm making any kind of bolognese, any kind of like meat-based sauce, meat-based chili, meat-based soups, I like to use mushrooms. You cook them down and it gives it a nice, really earthy, meaty flavor. So rather than reaching for those fancy mushrooms that my brother likes to use all the time in the UK, I like these simple, everyday mushrooms in a lot of recipes. So let's start that up. So the key to making these minced as consistent as possible is not just to hit the on button and walk away. It's to hit it and shake it rather than scraping it, okay? So all that's doing is scraping it off the sides so they're falling back into mince rather than, again, the fine mince with some chunks left over, so. Just gonna pulse it up. That's it, okay? So a fine mince. You can see a nice texture, nice consistency here. This is gonna be the start of our chili as sort of that meat portion of this chili con carne here. So let's just add these to the bowl. Make sure you get the smallest bowl you can find to fit as many mushrooms as you can in there. We are ready to go. I have half an onion. We're gonna start off with a little drizzle of olive oil in there. Now, you can easily not use oil in this recipe just by adding the onions to a dry pan, making sure the pan is hot. De-glaze it with a little bit of vegetable stock. That's a great way to make this recipe oil-free. For those of you who are curious, I'm gonna go ahead and add the onions to the pan. All right, so as the onions are starting to cook down, I wanna get these till they're almost translucent, okay? And then I'm gonna add the spices. So I'm gonna mince these up. This is gonna be quite spicy. Let's just mince these chipotles up and we'll put them right back in that little container. And if you like the heat, chili is a perfect way to emphasize it. At home, because I have a couple small kids, I like to make my chili, unfortunately, not that spicy. And then I'll just add the spice when I'm serving it. All right, so these look good. They're starting to become nice and translucent. Now's a good time to add these spices. So more spice than you would think. So I have some cumin in there. I have some chili powder. I have some smoked paprika. Next, I add the garlic at this point. Now, I've mentioned this in a number of videos in the past that I like to add garlic after the onions are cooked. This way, you're not looking at any burnt garlic in your recipe. So I'm gonna slice these just really thin rather than a mince. So this chili is such a versatile recipe. It's one of those recipes also, because it is so simple to make any one-pot meal, any soups or chowders or thick stews. I like to make big batches. So I'll save a couple quarts. I'll put them in the freezer immediately after the soup cools down. That way, I have a quick meal on the go with my family. We have the onions in there. We're toasting up the spices. I'm gonna add all these mushrooms that we just minced up. Okay, now, mushrooms do take a little bit of moisture. So I'm gonna make sure there's a little bit of oil in the pan. We're gonna cook those down with those spices. Oh, it smells so good. All right, these mushrooms are cooking down quite nice. I mentioned beans, okay? And if you're gonna be cooking these fresh, even better, but these ones here are canned. Make sure you're choosing low sodium, if possible. Low to no sodium. That way, you can really monitor the amount of sodium that you're adding to your dish here. You can see here, now, as they start cooking, these mushrooms, they're gonna release a lot of water. And you know that this is gonna be done when the mushrooms start sticking to the bottom of the pan here. So they're gonna release water, and they're gonna concentrate in flavor. And that's really the meaty portion of this chili. This is a great opportunity when you have chili to kick up the vegetable. So I like to use a little bit of zucchini in my chili. It works really well, and it's a great way just to get the kids eating some zucchini, in my opinion. I'm just gonna chop those up. Just give them a small dice. Okay, so you can see here that this is starting to stick, which is a great thing. And that means that the water content in those mushrooms are starting to cook out, okay? You're really concentrating that flavor, getting that meatiness come up. All right, so this is a nice time to add some chili. Again, you can add your desired heat level. We're going to make this one quite spicy. And then here is a key ingredient that I have, is I have pickled jalapeno juice, okay? I like that for the acidity and also for the heat, but there's just something so nice about the acidity and the juice that just gives this chili a really nice kick. And that's a good time to start adding all the beans now. So I have some pintos, I have some black beans, I have some kidney beans. I'm gonna add the zucchini at the same time. Now it's on a medium to high heat. I can lower it down to medium after I get all these ingredients in. But really, chili, this is such a quick dish, but it also, it does get better if you let it simmer for a little bit longer. So, yum. I have one can of crushed tomatoes. I have some vegetable stock, almost equal parts of the tomato. Yeah, I'd say equal, that's good. Stir that up. Looks good, this is hearty. And you can see the mushrooms, how it really adds that meatiness. Just like if you were to add any kind of meaty plant-based crumble there. I'm gonna finish seasoning it. Add some sea salt in there. All right, just gonna stir up that mixture. That's a good amount of liquid there, but it will reduce the longer it cooks. So we're gonna simmer it for about 10 to 12 minutes. Let's speed it up with the lid. Oh, shoot. All right, there we go. Let's go ahead and add the lid. We're gonna reduce that down over about 10 to 12 minutes, but we're just gonna speed up the cooking process to a simmer with the lid on. Take the lid off, let it simmer for a little bit longer, and then we're gonna season to taste, and it's gonna be good to go. All right, let's check on that simmer. Nice, that is good to go. We're gonna keep the lid off. We're gonna let this simmer for about 10 minutes. All right, so this has been simmering for a little while. I wanna try it because of that amount of jalapeno juice, I wanna make sure it's not too acidic. That is so good. The heat level is really nice. It's a little acidic, which is a good thing. You can use it to your advantage. So I have a little bit of agave here. You can use a little maple, you can use a little agave, you can add a little brown sugar in there. Let's stir that up. So if you like a thicker chili, you can certainly add a little bit of tomato paste. We're gonna keep this as is. I like this a little bit thin rather than a thick, thick stew so let's prep some garnishes here. I have some green onions. All right, let's lower this down. This is good to go. It smells so good with all those spices in there, the jalapenos in there, the chipotle with that little bit of smokiness. This is one of those recipes that are so nice as leftovers and it only gets better, I feel, in the fridge for a day. Let's top that off with the garnishes. We have some vegan sour cream, a little dollop. Have some vegan shredded cheese, some green onions, some sliced jalapeno, and some cilantro. That is just such a nice, comforting bowl right there of Wicked Good Chili. Obviously, I serve them with chips and this is so good. Packed with heat, packed with protein, and a great one-pot meal for you and the family. So good. That looks ******* hot. All right, so there you have it, a Wicked Good Chili. Such a versatile one-pot meal. 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