Spice up your meals with these easy and robust-flavored chili beans. Crockpot (slow cooker) and Instant Pot friendly, you’ll want to double the recipe to transform leftovers into a chili mac n’ cheese, chili loaded sweet potatoes or tamale pie dinner later in the week!

Whole, dried chili peppers add incredible depth of flavor, texture and color to this recipe. I leave them intact to make it easier to remove and puree them in the final step. However, feel free to  remove the  stems and seeds prior to putting them in your cooking vessel, if desired.

This recipe is made using dry beans, however, cooked beans can also be substituted. See Recipe Notes for details.

Oil free, gluten free, allium-free, soy free, corn-free, plant-based & vegan. 

Let’s begin!

Add all of the ingredients, except the lemon juice and salt, to your slow cooker or instant pot. Stir the mixture.

Note: If you just want the flavor of the chili peppers without much heat, substitute each whole, dry chili pepper for about 1.5 tsp, each, of dry, ground chili powder. Feel free to add 2-3 cups of your favorite chopped vegetables together with 1/2 cup of dry, uncooked quinoa to the slow cooker / Instant pot during this step to make your resulting dish a hearty meal! 

Cook the chili beans until they are softened enough to smush with a wooden spoon. I find that 35 minutes under the Pressure Cook setting on the Instant Pot OR 4.5 hours in my crockpot both create equally desirable results. 

Once the chili beans are done cooking, remove the now reconstituted chili peppers and puree them in about 1.5 cups of chili beans. Add the puree back into the chili bean mixture.

Add salt and lemon juice to taste and serve!

Note: Store any cooled leftovers for up to 1 week in the fridge or 1-3 months in the freezer.  

Enjoy!

Print Recipe

Chili Beans

Spice up your meals with these easy and robust-flavored chili beans. Crockpot (slow cooker) and Instant Pot friendly–Add veggies and quinoa to make it a full blown meal. Double the recipe to enjoy leftovers throughout the week!

Prep Time5 mins

Cook Time35 mins

Course: Main Course, Side Dish

Cuisine: American, Mexican

Keyword: allium free, chili beans, chipotle pepper, corn free, gluten-free, guajillo pepper, oil free, pasilla pepper

Servings: 4

Calories: 330kcal

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups uncooked beans consider using soaked beans to speed up cook times
• 3 cups diced tomatoes in juice
• 2 cups water or broth of choice
• 1 each dried guajillo, pasilla and chipotle pepper Substitute your favorite dried chili peppers or 1.5 tsp (each) of dried/ground chili pepper powder for ‘flavor’ instead of ‘heat’
• 1 tsp ground cayenne pepper optional, to taste
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin to taste
• 2-3 tbsp lemon juice to taste
• 1/2 tsp salt to taste
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tsp sugar optional

Instructions

• Add all the ingredients to the slow cooker or instant pot. Stir. 
• Cook. Slow Cooker: 4.5 hours on ‘high.’ Instant Pot: Pressure Cook for 35 minutes on ‘high.’ This can be reduced to 15 minutes if the beans are soaked overnight, in advance.
• Remove the whole dried chili peppers (if using) and puree in 1.5 cups of chili beans in cooking liquid. Add the puree back into the chili beans and serve!

Notes

Easily add 2-3 cups of your favorite vegetables and up to 1/2 cup of quinoa to this recipe (prior to cooking) to make it a meal.

The sugar content of this recipe is optional. Peppers generally tend have a bitter edge to them. This can be countered by including vegetables or sugar to balance the flavors of this dish, prior to cooking. 

Store cooled chili beans for up to 1 week in the fridge, or for 1-3 months in the freezer. 

March 9, 2019 Update:

To use cooked/canned beans, substitute the dry beans with 3 cups rinsed/strained cooked beans. Also reduce the water/broth quantity to 1/2 cup.

The cook time for uncooked beans varies on the type, size and age of the specific ones you are using. 35 minutes under high pressure in the Instant Pot has worked pretty consistently for me. However, this past week I found an old package of extra-large kidney beans that ended up taking 45 minutes. Craziness. Based on that experience, I definitely recommend pre-soaking the dry beans overnight to speed up cooking time. It’s better for the gut, too 🙂 

The whole dry chili peppers in this recipe are more for a flavor than for heat. 1.5 tsp of dry ground chili powder (for each chili pepper) is a sufficient substitution for those who just want a ‘touch’ of chili flavor. Consider adding more dry, ground chili powder, to taste, after the meal is done cooking, if desired.

 

Updated recipe notes on March 9, 2019.