vegetarian chili

With fall in the air who doesn't love a good chili dinner on a cool night? Over the years we've experimented with many different chili recipes and I always felt like chili doesn't require meat to be delicious. I think we've tried more vegetarian chili recipes than meat. This Vegetarian Chili from Everyday Food Light is loaded with beans and uses only zucchini and tomatoes as main vegetables.

Now, as far a chili is concerned, this is relatively quick, but still takes at least 45 minutes start to finish. Using such a large amount of tomato paste really speeds up the thickening process and adds depth to what might ordinarily be considered "too light". This chili is a great option for dinner in a pinch because most of the other ingredients are pantry staples where all you'd need to buy fresh is the zucchini. I think zucchini has a bad rap, I know I struggled accepting it. But lately it's one of my main vegetables of choice because it's easy to chop, is low calorie, keeps a wonderful texture when cooked and takes on the flavours of anything you cook it with. The contrast in texture between the beans and zucchini is my favourite element of this particular recipe. 
One note about this recipe is that it requires a can of green chilies. I didn't look too hard, but didn't come across any, so we substituted canned jalapenos and only put a few in. I'd love to try this again using chilies because jalapenos have a very strong heat you feel in your throat and chest and is probably not for everyone. 
I love how inexpensive this chili is to make, the limited amount of prep work and how truly delicious it is. Overall, I think we have another Everyday Food Light winner.