Meet the best vegetarian chili recipe I've tasted! It's thick, hearty, and comforting, filled with flavorful veggies and two types of beans.
This vegetarian chili is the ultimate cold weather comfort food. I make it on repeat throughout the fall and winter because it’s warming, hearty, and flavorful. Made with two types of beans, corn, peppers, and more, it packs in a hefty amount of veggies, but it’s still a hit with meat lovers (just ask Jack!).
This easy vegetarian chili recipe calls for a short list of pantry ingredients. To make it, you only need to do a few minutes of hands-on prep. Then, let it simmer away on its own. 30 minutes later, this thick, smoky, spicy veggie chili will be ready to dish up.
Healthy and delicious, this is a great recipe for busy weeknights, game day, or any time you’re craving something cozy. Enjoy!
How to Make Vegetarian Chili
This vegetarian chili recipe is easy to make! It starts with these simple ingredients:
Recipe Ingredients
- Onion, garlic, and red bell pepper – These savory veggies build delicious flavor. For an even bigger veggie punch, toss in a chopped carrot or celery rib too!
- Fire-roasted diced tomatoes – A chili essential! I prefer fire-roasted tomatoes to regular diced ones because they add smoky depth to the chili.
- Pinto and kidney beans – Canned beans make this recipe SO simple to prepare, but you could also cook your beans from scratch. Feel free to change up the types of beans if you like. Black beans are also delicious here.
- Water or vegetable broth – It helps the chili cook down to a stewy, saucy consistency.
- Chipotle peppers in adobo sauce – These canned peppers are the star ingredient in this vegetarian chili recipe. They add AMAZING smoky, spicy flavor. For even more depth, stir in a teaspoon each of chili powder and cumin, but these spices are optional. The chipotles and adobo sauce add plenty of flavor on their own!
- Corn kernels – For color and crunch. Fresh and frozen corn both work well.
- Fresh lime juice – For bright, tangy flavor.
- And salt and pepper – To make all the flavors pop!
Find the complete recipe with measurements below.
Process
Once you prep your ingredients, making this veggie chili is a breeze! You can find the complete recipe with measurements at the bottom of this post, but for now, here’s an overview of how it goes:
Start by sautéing the aromatics. Heat the oil in a large pot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion and cook until it softens, about 5 minutes. Then, add the pepper and cook for another 5 minutes or so, until it’s also soft. Stir in the garlic, chili powder, and cumin and cook for 30 seconds, until fragrant.
Next, simmer. Add the diced tomatoes, beans, chipotles, adobo sauce, corn, water, and salt and pepper. Bring the chili to a boil, then reduce the heat and cover the pot. Simmer for 25 minutes, or until the chili thickens. Give it a good stir every 10 minutes or so.
Finally, season to taste. Add the lime juice and more salt and pepper as desired.
Top the plant-based chili with your favorite fixings, and dig in!
What to Serve with Vegetarian Chili
The toppings are half the fun of this vegetarian chili recipe! Load up your bowl with flavorful fixings such as these:
- A dollop of sour cream, vegan sour cream, or Greek yogurt
- Pickled red onions
- Sliced jalapeño peppers, serrano chiles, or pickled jalapeños
- Chopped fresh cilantro
- Shredded cheddar cheese
- Sliced or diced avocado
Enjoy a bowl of this chili on its own, or pair it with tortilla chips, cornbread, or a baked sweet potato for a heartier meal. Or, for a fun game day snack, top it onto sweet potato wedges to make sweet potato chili fries!
How to Store Vegetarian Chili
This homemade vegetarian chili keeps well in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 5 days. The flavor improves as it sits in the fridge, so I actually like the leftovers better than the freshly cooked chili!
Freezing
This recipe also freezes well for up to 3 months. Allow the veggie chili to cool to room temperature and transfer it to freezer-safe containers or jars, leaving an inch for it to expand at the top. Seal and freeze.
Allow frozen chili to thaw in the fridge before reheating it on the stove or in the microwave.
More Favorite Soup Recipes
If you love this veggie chili, try one of these delicious soups or stews next:
- Instant Pot Chili
- Black Bean Soup
- Best Lentil Soup
- Butternut Squash Soup
- Or any of these 35 Best Soup Recipes!
Vegetarian Chili
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 small yellow onion, chopped
- 1 red bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and diced
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 teaspoon chili powder, optional
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin, optional
- 1 (14-ounce) can diced fire-roasted tomatoes
- 1 (14-ounce) can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 (14-ounce) can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 cup water or vegetable broth
- 3 chipotle peppers from a can of chipotles in adobo, diced*
- 3 tablespoons adobo sauce
- 1 cup corn kernels, fresh or frozen
- ½ teaspoon sea salt, plus more to taste
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice, plus wedges for serving
Topping options:
- Avocado, diced or sliced
- Greek yogurt or sour cream
- Jalapeño or serrano peppers, diced or sliced
- Fresh cilantro
- Pickled Onions
Instructions
- Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add the onion, a pinch of salt, and several grinds of pepper and stir. Cook until the onion is translucent, 5 minutes, then add the red pepper. Stir and cook until soft, 5 to 8 minutes, turning down the heat as needed.
- Add the garlic, chili powder, and cumin, if using, and stir for 30 seconds, until fragrant.
- Add the tomatoes, beans, water, chipotles, adobo sauce, corn, salt, and several grinds of pepper. Cover, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until the chili has thickened.
- Stir in the lime juice and season to taste. Serve with desired toppings.
Notes
I made this for a Chili Cook-Off party, and it was delicious! I don’t eat meat and this was the only vegetarian chili at the party. This recipe came through my feed at the perfect time!
I came across this recipe in the October Cooking Club email. This chili was the perfect warm and delicious meal to satisfy my family for dinner! We enjoyed it alongside hot and sweet jalapeños from Trader Joe’s, homemade pickled onions, and a touch of sour cream to balance out the heat. This will definitely be a staple dish that I look forward to making throughout the winter!
I’m so glad you loved it!
Looking forward to having this for my lunches this week…very tasty!
I’m glad you’re enjoying it!
Thank you for this recipe! I really enjoyed the kick and smokiness from the chipotles in adobo! What a delicious, quick fall recipe! I used pinto and black beans and thought it was amazing!
Hi Melanie, I’m so glad you loved it!
Easy, versatile and tasty. I used poblano peppers, leeks, onions and tomatoes from my garden.
This was the perfect recipe to make for dinner tonight since it’s a rainy, chilly, blustery day outside that just screamed for a pot of chili. We’ve been trying to replace all of our old favorite meat-heavy recipes with plant-based substitutions, and this was a big hit with the entire family, including the die-hard carnivores. I’ll definitely be making it again!
Never thought I’d make chili without the meat, but this did not disappoint in any way! I did crack open what felt like a million cans of beans, but I honestly did love the blend (not to mention all the amazing fiber!!). Flavor was spot on, and also got all the warm, comforting feels from the dish so just what I want right now 🙂 I would say if you are skeptical to go right ahead and make this and I really don’t think you’ll be dissapointed!
This recipe sounds amazing! Unfortunately, however, some of the ingredients are unavailable in Ireland, such as the tinned Chipotle chilli’s and the fire-roasted tomatoes: more’s the pity! I guess you can substitute other tinned veggies, and play around with using something like smoked paprika to get the smoky flavour…any other suggestions?
I am looking for the nutritional information because I am watching my saturated fat consumption.
Thanks!
Hi Paulette, unfortunately, we don’t currently have nutrition facts for all our recipes, including this one. Sorry about that! You could use an online nutrition calculator to get the saturated fat content for this recipe.
Where is the nutritional information?
Hi!
I’m making this now.
I made my own adobo sauce via Keviniscooking, which also meant I made my own chili powder from what’s in my cabinet – our apartments share air pretty easily and with two cats and 550 sq ft, blitzing dried hot peppers was a non-starter lol, but I made sure to add extra smoked paprika and ancho chili powder alongside regular ol’ cayenne.
I doubled this, as I prefer large batches.
I added 6 strips of cheapo bacon that I cooked down to crispy bits to help bolster what I lost by not being able to get fire-roasted tomatoes, 8 stalks of celery, 2 tbsp of said chili powder because we love flavor in this establishment, and I’m anticipating needing to add some brown sugar to help balance out the dirty dry adobo sensation, and probably a little lemon or cider vinegar if the regular diced tomatoes aren’t acidic enough here.
Thanks for posting this, I’m always trying new chili recipes and with a little need to cut costs, was after something that wasn’t needing beef, as I live in Vancouver BC and meat can be pretty costly here and my usual stash of Costco ground beef is vacant.
Oh! I forgot to say that I used just three chipotle peppers from a tin of adobo sauce ones because it’s $4.50 for a little tin (I know!!!), and so that’s part of why I added extra of my mixed up chili powder. I also used my instant pot to do quick soak beans, one pound dry of red kidney and one pound of dry pinto, 8 c water per, a few bay leaves, salt, garlic and onion powder in each as well. It gave me enough cooked beans to do a quadruple batch of this so I threw the rest into a ziplock gallon bag laid flat in my freezer to freeze for next time. The bacon was on sale, 2 packs for $8.50 so using 6 strips only added $2.13 to this recipe.
I’ll be putting this on roasted sweet potatoes and maybe adding sour cream if I’m wanting a little creaminess.
Wow ! Didnt see the pepper spice not at end of recipes
Smokey amd spicey. Def recommend using 1 pepper not whole can of adobe.
Great recipe but next time ill be toning it way down !
This is a winner! Absolutely delicious! Thank you! Love your recipes!
So glad you loved the chili, Jennifer!
I made this but didn’t use chipotles. I have chili powder with a medium heat that was perfect. I also added rutabaga, carrots and potatoes for extra vegetable heartiness. My family LOVED it.
oh yum! Sounds so good with those extra veggies.
This is delicious! It is very spicy, so next time I will use less chipotle peppers (maybe just 1 rather than 3), but I do really like it. 🙂
I’m glad you enjoyed it!
I like spicy foods! However, I would recommend adding ONLY 1 chipotle and taste. I added 2 chipotle and sauce and it was too spicy had to add another can of tomatoes to cut the heat.
I want to throw some beyond sausage in there too. Any advice?
Hi Lisa, I would use the beyond meat crumbles and cook it after the onion is done cooking but before moving onto step 2.