Grandma’s Vegan Chili

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Grandma’s Vegan Chile Recipe

Not all chili is created equal. To be called chili, the dish must transform the soul and make the world a better place. My mom’s chili does just that, but she never used a recipe and none of us knew how she cooked it. Now she is ninety-one and no longer cooks. However, three years ago I filmed her in detail cooking her chili.

Last week at work I offered to cook chili for an event, so I went through the 70 minutes of footage, gleaned Grandma’s recipe, and wow! Yum! Even the devout Texas carnivores at work were secretly whispering, “Damn! This is good!” As with all chili, make it your own. Enjoy! Thank you mom for years of delicious cooking. I love you.

Grandma’s Vegan Chili
Helpful tools: A flat tip wooden spatula for stirring and scraping the bottom of the pot and a dough scraper when chopping.
1 lb. of pinto beans soaked overnight.
2 med/large yellow Onions
14 med/large cloves of garlic
1 cup olive or vegetable oil
5-6 jalapenos – 2-3 with seeds and 3 without seeds
3 to 4 bell peppers – red, yellow, orange, green, your choice.
8 Roma tomatoes
4 heaping Tbs. cumin seeds toasted in a non-stick pan until they are slightly brown, then powdered in a spice grinder.
1 ½ – 2 lbs. any veggie crumbles
4 heaping tsp. spoons of Better Than Bouillon Sofrito base added to 4 cups of hot water. (You can use any flavor, but some are not vegan.)
28 oz can of small/petite diced tomatoes
1/3 cup chili powder
1/4 cup Braggs Amino
2 bunches Cilantro

Soak your pinto beans overnight.
Put oil in a very large pot.
Dice your onions and dice or press your garlic.
Add the garlic and onions to pot (not yet turned on)
Remove seeds from 3 jalapenos and chop/dice all jalapenos and add to pot.
Core the peppers and use only the outsides, not the core or seeds. Dice and add to the pot.
Turn on heat and once everything is at a medium/high heat, stir regularly and cook the veggies/everything for 20 minutes.
Ready a separate pot of hot water to blanch the Roma tomatoes.
Soak and clean the cilantro in cold water for later.
After 10 minutes of the veggies cooking, add 1 ½ to 2 pounds of any veggie ground beef. (Use the flat tip wooden spatula to prevent sticking. Add a little water if needed to prevent sticking.)
After 20 minutes, continue cooking on a med/high heat and add the beans (strained), the bullion water, the Braggs, the canned tomatoes, and the chili powder to the veggies.
Chop the cilantro fine and add to the pot.
In the pot of boiling water, add Roma tomatoes and leave the heat on high for no more than 3 minutes, then dump the tomatoes into a strainer and let cool for five minutes. Peel the skins and dice and carve out the tops keeping as much of the liquid as possible (A dough scraper is an excellent tool for picking up liquidy diced tomatoes). Add the tomatoes to the pot.
Toast the cumin seeds in a non-stick pan and when they are lightly toasted, let them cool a couple of minutes, then powder them in a spice grinder. Add the ground cumin to the pot.

Stir everything very well and bring to a very vigorous simmer. Cover and cook for five hours stirring as needed and adjusting heat as needed. Add water as needed for desired consistency.
Grandma’s Vegan Chili PDF