What vegetables are good in chili?

Cafe Society
1

Rather than hijack this thread – http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=299664 – I decided to start a new one. Other than those vegetables which are considered more or less basic to (or at least unobjectionable in) a chili recipe – i.e., chile peppers, sweet bell peppers, onions, garlic, tomatoes, and beans – what vegetables go well in chili? Various recipes I’ve read suggest:
celery

corn

nopalito cactus

carrots (vegetarian recipes only)

zucchini (ditto)
Have you ever tried any of these? How did you like the result?

I’ve never seen any recipes calling for okra. I like okra in gumbo and other Cajun/creole dishes, I find myself wondering how it would go in chili. Also mushrooms. Never seen a chili recipe, even a vegetarian one, calliing for mushrooms.

2

I’ve had it with corn and it’s not that bad, even if it is just filler.

Celery though? No way. I’d starve first.

3

I’ve eaten the vegetarian chili here. It has mushrooms in it, and I thought it was pretty good.

4

Celery is an ingredient in “Jay’s Chili,” which one the International Chili Society’s 11th Annual World’s Championship in 1977; and in Nevada Annie’s Champion Chili, which one the following year. See Championship Chili: Winning Chili Recipes of the World’s Top Competitors.

I’ve made chili with corn sliced right of the cob into the pot. It’s good – too good, IMO; takes attention away from the meat.

Nobody has an opinion on okra?

5

Okra is Satan’s Vegetable, and has no place in human food, much less the wonder and glory that is chili!

Tomatoes, chilis, onions…that’s about it. I’ll tolerate green peppers. Maybe. :smiley:

6

Has anyone ever tried chili with nopalitos? I think they’re kind of slimy. (Not as hard to find as you might think, BTW – just look in the Mexican-foods section of any supermarket. They come in a jar with liquid, cut into strips about twice as thick as string beans.)

7

I’ve had nopalitos with other dishes, but never in chili. They aren’t half-bad.

8

What, you don’t eat gumbo?

9

Shhhhh!

It also turns up in my grandmother’s soup from time to time.

But in each case, it is as an “unidentified” filler. Okra, in and of itself, is vile.

10

I consider myself a proud Afrikan ready to sample anything from curry goat to coconut fish stew, but even I’ll admit fresh okra gives me pause. In soups and stews, that’s one seriously slimy vegetable, my arch-nemesis as a child.

I can generally eat it in most tomato-based gumboes without too much effort now, provided there’s plenty of rice and/or cornbread around… and maybe it’ll be edible in a tomato-based chili, too. Dunno. You go first, BrainGlutton.

11

My mom always put celery in her chili and so do I. In addition to tomatoes, garlic and green bell peppers, I’ve also used red and yellow bell peppers and carrots (shredded). I usually always use 3 types of beans; pinto, kidney and black beans. I may add a white bean to that list. Occasionally I may add some jalapenos.

I’ve never tried this but I know someone who makes a green chili using tomatillos.

12

Celery, yep. Onions, and just about any kind of pepper.

Diced tomato is important too.

Carrots? Umm not for me. Not in chili. I guess it would be O.K though.

And, of course, beans. At least Red Kidney Beans and Chili Beans. Pinto Beans too.

13

There is no such thing as a “chili bean.” Some kinds of beans have become associated with chili. A can labelled “chili beans” is probably kidney or pinto beans in a chili sauce.

14

Kidney beans are the devil’s own vomit (except for Camillia red beans). Black beans or pintos, please. Tomatillos are for chili verde, which is a whole 'nuther thread.

15

I tried creamed corn last time I made chili. Not bad, but not nearly as good as I thought. I was expecting a good filler that added some thickness and consistency, and a little bit of background flavor, but what I got was, as someone mentioned, an overtone of corn to the whole dish.

Carrots I’ve been meaning to try, but for some reason I feel like they have to be diced into tiny little cubes and I don’t have a knife that I trust myself to do that with. I don’t think I’d like shredded carrots in my chili.

I’m surprised to see so many people okra-bashing here; I grew up on that stuff. Maybe it’s just the look of it that squicks some of you out? It has very little actual flavor but a great consistency. Try frying it up with some cornbread mix. It’s heavenly.

16

Nopalitos rock, but I think they’d be a bit too, I dunno, maybe citrusy or sour for something like chili. Okra rocks, too, and would go well in a meat stew, but I’m not sure if I would call the resulting concoction “chili.” Potatos, of course, would also be great added towards the end of the cooking time, but once again, not chili.
Same with most of the veggies listed here.

17

Great consistency*? That’s what most people *hate *about it. It’s Satan’s snot. Ergh.

18

I’m not a chili theologian. All that blather about what is and is not chili just bores me.

My chili gets thin sliced celery. Yes! Celery! Take that, you stiff-boxers purist! Ha!

19

Well as a garnish…believe it or not sauerkraut! After the chile is cooked and ready to serve, liberally sprinkly a few shreds of warm kraut around on top of the chili. Mmmmmm…Mmmmm goood. The vinegary bite of the kraut and the spicy beans nature of the chili combine in an odd but wonderful way.

20

I’ve shredded zucchini and put it in chili and it works really well–I can’t really even tell it’s in there, and it becomes ‘one’ with the chili and I feel like I’ve sneaked some extra vegetable matter into my diet painlessly.

Shredded zucchini can be slipped into spaghetti sauce and meatloaf too, but that’s another thread.