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I made this today and it is absolutely the best veg chili ever. Unbelievably delicious and the ‘meat’ mixture is a stroke of genius. Thank you 😘
Watch How To Make This Vegetarian Chili
Vegetarian Chili That Actually Tastes Like Chili.
Chili chili chili, can’t you see? Sometimes your ways just hypnotize me and even when you’re made without meat?!
Yes, that’s right. I’d like to introduce to you a really good, really “meaty” and satisfying vegetarian chili that, in fact, does not have meat in it at all.
This vegetarian chili is all the good things that I’m looking for:
- thick and hearty and “meaty”, like a standard chili texture
- beans optional – add if you like them, leave out if you don’t
- big, big, big happy flavor
- packed with a variety of veggies
- easy to make
- makes awesome leftovers
- meatless!
If you’re vegan, don’t you worry – this is also a VEGAN chili if you just watch your toppings. Avocado, pickled red onion, radishes, tortilla chips… we got you, vegans. Also: see our Instant Pot Pumpkin Walnut Chili recipe – it’s real good.
I am not a vegetarian or vegan but I hope it’s obvious that I think creative plant-based cooking is so fun and I love the positive impact it has on our bodies and the earth. ♡ You can be all kinds of everything (vegan, vegetarian, or none, IMHO) and 100% enjoy this.
Goals for the rest of the month: more vegetables, and more chili nights!
How To Make Vegetarian Chili
1
Make the “meat” for the chili.
Walnuts, mushrooms, and carrots all blitzed up in a food processor. This is your chili “meat” for this recipe. All vegetarian!
2
Sauté onions and garlic.
Heat a Dutch Oven or another large pot on the stove and get all those good house smells going!
3
Add chiles, tomato paste, and spices.
I love the kick and acidity the green chiles bring and the deep flavor from the tomato paste. Smoked paprika and soy sauce are bringing a bit of a delicious surprise too!
4
Add the “meat” back in.
Let it simmer and cook for about 10 minutes to get the vegetables soft and delicious.
5
Let it simmer.
Add the tomatoes and beans and let it all simmer together for 45 minutes.
6
Add Your Toppings and Eat!
Top with all the usual suspects – sour cream, cheese, cilantro, etc. Get your tortilla chips and get in there!
Ingredients List
Walnuts, Mushrooms, and Carrots
This is the “meat” base of the chili. Pulsed up in a food processor, it’s just absolute texture-perfection. Love this so much.
Onion and Garlic
One of the basic cornerstones of any good chili!
Canned Stuff
The gang’s all here – diced green chiles for a kick of heat, tomato paste for that deep tomato flavor, and canned tomatoes for sauciness.
Spices
We’ve got chili powder and cumin for that classic chili flavor, and then a punch of smoked paprika.
Soy Sauce
Noy typical for chili, but I love it. Soy sauce adds the perfect little dose of umami and saltiness.
Beans
Most veggie chilis are very bean-heavy, but I’m not about that (hence that delicious meatless base). Just one can of beans here is all we need! Black beans or pinto beans would be my pick.
About The “Meat” In This Vegetarian Chili
This vegetarian chili features a hearty mixture of walnuts, mushrooms, and carrots that can beautifully stand in place of your ground beef and absorbs the big flavors of sautéed onion and garlic, diced green chiles, and all those spices. When scooped and topped with some avocado or cheese, sour cream or tortilla chips, it’s just warming and so satisfying in that chili-specific way. And, bonus, it’s totally meatless.
I have some requirements for my vegetarian chili and the first is that I want it to be really on-point texturally. I want it to scoop like a real chili. I don’t want soup, okay? I want a thick and meaty-like chili texture. The “meat” mixture in this recipe is going to ensure that texture.
My second requirement for my veg chili is equally as important: LOW-TO-NO BEANS. I love beans as much as the next person, but sometimes I feel like they are overused in vegetarian lookalike recipes (like vegetarian chili, for example) where we could easily use vegetables more creatively instead of defaulting to 27 types of beans as the base of the recipe.
I don’t know, I have opinions, okay?
Storage and Freezing
As all chilis do, this makes for great leftovers! Here’s how to store in the fridge and freezer:
- Storing In The Fridge: Store in an airtight container – it will keep for 3-4 days. Add more liquid/water if it needs to loosen up at all.
- Storing In The Freezer: Cook the entire recipe and freeze in an airtight container (or two) – it will keep for up to 6 months. When you’re ready to cook, let it thaw in the fridge overnight and heat on the stove.
Frequently Asked Questions For Vegetarian Chili
I would either omit them and just increase the mushrooms, or you could try another softer nut like pecans. The flavor won’t be quite the same but I could see the texture still working! If you give it a try, let us know in the comments!
You could try omitting them, but the texture will be a little different. I’d recommend giving this one a try to see if it converts you! 🙂 The mushrooms are chopped SO small that you hardly even notice they’re there.
This does not work well in a blender as it can’t get it to quite the right consistency throughout. If you don’t have a food processor, I’d probably opt for using a knife and chopping it all very finely on a cutting board.
Nope, not at all! Just be sure to use mild green chiles instead of hot.
This chili is naturally vegan as well! Just be sure to skip the cheese and sour cream on top (or use your favorite vegan alternative).
Click here to see the step-by-step web story instructions for this recipe!
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Vegetarian Chili
- Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
- Yield: 5-6 1x
- Diet: Vegetarian
Description
Vegetarian Chili that’s “meaty” and satisfying – without the meat! A hearty mixture of walnuts, mushrooms, and carrots as your base, with big flavors of onion, garlic, green chiles and spices. SO GOOD.
Ingredients
The “Meat:”
- 1 cup walnuts
- 8 ounces fresh mushrooms, washed, stems removed
- 4 medium carrots, cut into chunks
The Chili:
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 onion, finely diced
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 6–ounce can diced green chiles (or fresh minced jalapeños)
- 3 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2–3 tablespoons chili powder
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1–2 teaspoons salt (more or less to taste)
- 2 14–ounce cans diced or crushed tomatoes (with juices)
- 1 14–ounce can beans of choice (optional, see notes)
- 1 cup water
Instructions
- Make the “meat” – pulse all ingredients in a food processor until broken down into a chunky paste-like texture. Set aside.
- Heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onions and garlic. Sauté for 5-10 minutes until very soft.
- Add green chiles, tomato paste, chili powder, cumin, smoked paprika, and soy sauce. HELLO FLAVOR.
- Add your “meat” to the pan – once it mixes in and starts cooking, it should start to resemble chili meat. Let the “meat” cook for 10 minutes or so to soften the vegetables. Season with salt.
- Add tomatoes, beans if you want, and water to get the consistency right. Let it simmer for about 45 minutes to soften the vegetables, thicken it up, and let the flavors come together.
- Serve with your favorite chili toppings, and there it is! VEGETARIAN CHILI! You did it.
Equipment
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Buy Now → Notes
Beans: A lot of vegetarian chili recipes are based around beans, and I wanted this recipe to be bean-optional for people who don’t like or can’t have beans. So if you want to skip the beans altogether, no problem! That being said, I like black beans in this vegetarian chili, but kidney beans, white beans, or pinto beans would all be great.
Toppings: For vegetarian chili – sour cream and cheddar or queso fresco. For vegan chili – cilantro, avocado, pickled onion or jalapeno, radishes, tortilla chips.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 1 hour
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: vegetarian chili, vegan chili, chili recipe, healthy chili, vegetarian comfort food
Omigosh! I made tis chili today and it is delicious! The walnut meat base is superb and the flavors are immensely satisfying.
I tried this for the first time – to feed 8 people at a dinner party. Ack. But it was great. I did use a mashed up chipotle pepper instead of green chilies because that is what i had so flavour would have differed but the chipotle adds smokey heat. I agree with you, a vegetarian chili shouldn’t just be a bean stew, but I also agree with one of the other posters, it needs a can of beans in it, IMO, to give some oomph to the texture. Thanks for a healthy, easy to follow recipe that comes together very quickly!
This was so delicious. We added a bit of Jamaican mixed seasoning instead of salt, which gave us a nice flavour. I also added 2 tbs of cream cheese because it was a little too spicey for my son.
We ate this alongside your No Knead Cheesey Bread!!! A winning combo!!
I just made this chili and it knocked our socks off. We don’t eat meat but this was so hearty and delicious you’d never even guess it’s meatless. I added peppers that were turning sad in the crisper and extra seasoning for flavor oomph and served it with cornbread. Delicious! Definitely now part of the Winter line-up.
I have been searching for and making veg chili recipes for YEARS and they always left something to be desired. Until this one!! Texture? Check! Flavor? Check! Finally!! All with quality ingredients and nothing processed. So happy to have this as my go to recipe!
That’s great to hear!
Made this for dinner as written, except for using a 4-oz can of diced green chilis (I have never seen a 16-Oz can of them as the recipe states). It was so good! Will definitely be making this again throughout the winter.
We made this once already and it’s wonderful! We want to make it ahead for a party coming up…will it hold up well if I transfer it to a crockpot, and keep it on “warm” for 5-6 hours during the party??
Definitely!
Oh my, this is the BEST veggie chili recipe ever!!! I used combo of chickpeas & black lentils…yum-yum!!!! Thank you so much Lindsay for sharing this recipe!!
Really wanted to love this, but didn’t love the texture of the walnut mix. It just… disintegrated with no texture or chew. Much prefer bulgur or quinoa as a meat replacement. Nice to try something new, but this definitely didnt create a meat-like chili.
I made this last weekend for a fairly serious chili competition our local Rotary Club has hosted for 15 years and took 3rd place and was the winning veggie chili. Thanks for a wonderful recipe. Most people thought it had meat in it. I made it almost as written and doubled the quantity. I did make a few small tweaks because I’m an experienced cook and chili lover; instead of 2 onions (2x the recipe) I did 1 med onion and one very large shallot. For the chili powder I used half pure and half Penzey’s Chili 9000 for deeper flavor and a kick. I added 2t of cider vinegar for some balance, 1T unsweetened chocolate as I usually do, half a medium jalapeno minced, more salt than called for here and some black pepper. One last comment, when the competition was over the hosts asked if they could keep what was left of ours to share with some chili loving friends who were coming to see them the next day.
Delicious! My family loved it and none of us are vegetarian.
I’ve tried several vegetarian chili recipes and this one is by far the winner. I absolutely love it!! I doubled it and couldnt fit the carrots in my food processor so I just cooked them up diced with the onions. The mushroom/walnut combo really does have the texture of ground beef. And the spice was perfect!! This is the first time I’ve left a review on a recipe I loved it that much! Thank you for sharing!!
This is the most delicious vegetarian chilli I have ever had. I made it exactly as per the recipe and the flavors just come together perfectly each time. Thank you!
I’ve made this many times and we love it, but I always wondered: do you simmer it covered or uncovered?
I like to weigh ingredients if I’m not sure of the exact amount. In this recipe, about how much would “4 medium carrots” weigh? I’m going to make this for the first time tonight, and I’ll just wind it, but I’m curious about what you think the optimum amount of carrots would be.
Thank you!
This was delicious!
What can you substitute instead of walnuts? My son has a tree nut allergy, but can have almonds and peanuts. Could we substitute with almonds?
I made this for the first time yesterday – the entire pot didn’t last more than 24 hours. We DEVOURED this. Incredible!
Glad to hear it, Kim!
Sorry but this was a no for me. I found the flavors to be off putting and it just didn’t work. Went in the trash….
I’ve been looking everywhere for a hearty vegetarian chili that’s low carb for our family’s diabetic needs – this looks perfect! Can you share if the nutritional estimates you provided is with or without the optional beans included? Thanks so much!
I made this FODMAP friendly by omitting the garlic and onion and using onion and garlic infused oil instead. I also used oyster mushrooms.
Should have used a deeper pot. It splatters.
Thanks for recipe.
This chili!!! Oh my gosh. The depth of flavor, the texture, the endless veggie goodness – it’s one of the most delicious chili recipes I’ve ever made. Whole family loved it. Will definitely make again!
Glad to hear it, Janna!
This is consistently one of my favourite vegetarian recipes. It is worth the time put into it! My partner doesn’t like tinned tomatoes, so I use roasted red peppers and some extra water in their place – it works really well 🙂
Glad you’ve enjoyed it so much, Jo!
Oh my I just made this for my family. I didn’t have carrots and I only had one can of whole tomatoes and it was delicious. My family had zero clue it was meatless.
I made this chili today and was a bit disappointed. It has great ingredients but it was a bit watery. I did not even have to add the water or broth at the end. I think the flavors will meld better tomorrow. I cooked it in a very well seasoned cast iron dutch oven and it cooked well.