Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili
This Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili is a healthy, vegetarian spin on comfort food that's perfect for chilly weather! Dump everything in your crockpot and let the flavours mingle!
This post is sponsored by Dandy Fresh Produce. Thanks so much for supporting the brands I love – they help keep my blog up and running!
I am typically very suspicious of anything vegetarian, especially when it comes to things like chili and comfort food. I always wonder – will it have the same richness and flavours when there's no meat involved?
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Well, this Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili is here to break all expectations of what a proper chili should be. And coming from one meat-eater to another, you're gonna LOVE this stuff!
It's really the perfect meal to have after indulging a bit too much at Thanksgiving. I don't know about you, but I really went to town this past weekend and am looking forward to getting back into routine.
This Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili is rich, thick and just loaded with veggies. In fact, I really think the variety of vegetables is the reason it's filled with such vibrant flavours – between the bell peppers, sweet potato, garlic and celery, letting these flavours mingle so long in a slow cooker really does it all justice.
I'll even let you in on a little secret, and if I'm being honest, I didn't think it would make that much of a difference but it really does. DOUBLE THE CELERY! When Dandy Fresh Produce approached me to partner with them, at first I struggled to think of a way to make celery truly shine. I wanted it to be front and centre without it being too unique a recipe. When I sat back and really thought about it though, I think we don't really give celery too much credit in everyday cooking. But honestly, I add it to EVERYTHING.
Got a recipe that requires onions or garlic? Throw some celery in there for a bit more crunch! And why do you think coleslaw tastes so good? Umm, hello, CELERY salt! The flavour is one of my favourites – subtle, but not too overwhelming.
Wracking my brain, I thought back to one of my absolute favourite chili recipes as a kid: my grandpa's! While I really love my mom's chili recipe, it's kinda boring because it's a well-documented version from an old cookbook. Don't get me wrong, boring is good. You can count on boring to turn out every time. I kinda wish my grandpa had been more boring and documented his chili recipe, because I recently asked my grandma for it and she said, “Oh, I don't know, he used to just dump everything in one pot and go from there.”
Coming from a fellow Leo (his birthday was just 3 days after mine in August), I can see where his cooking style comes from. We extravagant party animals really do love to cook on the fly!
But considering this is a food blog, where I share actual written recipes, I knew I needed to actually, you know, write everything down in meticulous fashion. Sorry grandpa.
So anyway, I kept circling back to his chili recipe, remembering all the crunch and flavours while I devoured like 4 bowls at a time up at the family cottage. One key flavour that always stood out to me that I ADORED was the celery. He used heaps and heaps of it. Some people may even say it was too much, but I'm convinced that that's the reason his chili stood out from my mom's, and why I was so in love.
I'm actually thrilled to partner with Dandy because I love their celery sticks. They're already trimmed and ready for snacking, and it's super easy to just chop 'em up and add them to just about any recipe. No cleaning, no mess, no fuss. I used about 8 of their celery sticks in this recipe, and I know that sounds like a lot but it's one of the keys to this Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili. If you're looking for a hearty vegan stew this fall/winter season, this here will knock your socks off.
You'll also love this Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili because you can use up some of the veggies from your Thanksgiving leftovers (like maybe some celery you didn't quite use up for your stuffing), and continue on with fall comfort food despite the fact that the big feast is already over. And I don't know about you, but I always celebrate Thanksgiving two times. Canadian Thanksgiving just comes up way too fast, and I feel like I don't ever have the proper time to really savour it. So here's hoping this Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili will tide us over until American Thanksgiving in November!
Will you be making this Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Lentil Chili?
I seriously need more delicious slow cooker recipes in my life! I'm convinced that letting your dinner cook while you're away at work all day is possibly the most genius way to cook of all time and I don't know why I haven't been doing it more!
If you try any of my recipes be sure to let me know on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or in the comments – I’d love to see what you come up with!
| Prep Time | 20 minutes |
| Cook Time | 8 hours |
| Servings |
servings
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- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 8 stalks Dandy brand celery sticks, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 2 small yellow onions, diced
- 1 red pepper, chopped
- 1 green pepper, chopped
- 2 sweet potatoes, chopped
- 1 cup brown lentils, rinsed
- 4 cups vegetable broth
- One 750mL jar passata (strained tomatoes - alternatively, use crushed tomatoes)
- 1 tbsp chili powder
- 1 tsp cumin
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1/2 cup Corn
- 2 cups chopped spinach
Ingredients
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- Dump all ingredients except for corn and spinach in the slow cooker. Cook on low for 8 hours until sweet potatoes are tender and lentils are soft. Stir in corn and spinach, then serve with toppings of choice.
- Will keep frozen up to 2 months - to reheat, microwave on high for 5-7 minutes, stirring halfway through.
Ha, I have the same skepticism about vegetarian recipes, I’m always worried my stomach won’t fill as “full” as it would if the dish had meat in it (which is just silly). I’ve started really delving into veggie recipes just for fun (I cannot get enough lentils into my life right now) so definitely putting this on the list to try! 👍
I read in another recipe using lentils and tomatoes that you should cook the lentils in the crock pot first for 2 hours before adding in the diced tomatoes because the lentils won’t fully cook. Did you not have this issue? I made a Crock-Pot vegan lasagna
Hey Kerreena! I have tested this recipe a couple times now and it works just fine – keep in mind I’ve used strained tomatoes in this recipe which are a lot more liquid-y than diced tomatoes so the lentils absorb those and the broth. As long as you cook the 8 hours you will be fine!
Can you use green lentils?
Hey Kathy – I’m sure you could but I just can’t guarantee that they won’t be a bit mushier since I haven’t tried it myself. But my instincts tell me you should be fine 🙂
Hi!
Are the nutrition facts for the entire pot of chili? If that’s the case, is the amount of sugar because of the sweet potato??
Thanks!
Hey Michelle – that’s a single serving size (371 calories). The 13g of sugar you are seeing is likely natural sugars from the sweet potato, corn and canned crushed tomatoes.
Do I peel the sweet potatoe before chopping? Or does the skin stay on?
Yes peel the sweet potato before chopping 🙂
I just won my office chili cook-off using this recipe (competing against meat-filled chili). I did adjust a little bit adding a teaspoon of Garam Masala and a half teaspoon of cayenne.
WOOO HOOO!!!! So happy to hear it won against the meat chilis, that’s incredible! Thanks for sharing with me Tom, so glad you liked it 🙂