I freaking love chili. How about you? To me, it’s just always so comforting, warm, filling and hearty. YUMMMMMM.
Lately I’ve been on a real chili making binge. Can’t stop, won’t stop. I cooked up two batches last week and froze one for evenings when I don’t feel like cooking or simply don’t have the time. Sometimes I work out in the evenings and by the time I get back home my desire to start chopping vegetables and doing dishes is negative 1 million.
On the second night of eating my black bean chili for both lunch and dinner, I decided that I wanted to do something else with it. Certainly chili for lunch and dinner wasn’t the most versatile. Eating it plain again on the third day would have been just boring. I mean still tasty, but who wants to eat the same thing 3 nights in a row?
I glanced around the kitchen and realized I had some sweet potatoes begging to be baked. Now I could have just added them to the chili for a unique flavor, but then I realized that they would basically be even more awesome if I stuffed them with awesome things like chili, cheese and cilantro. And OMG you guys… I wish I had been doing this all along. The creamy texture and sweetness of the sweet potato was just incredible. Best of all, this meal was FILLING thanks to all the protein and fiber from the beans and sweet potato.
I used GO Veggie! Lactose Free Cheddar Shreds as my shredded cheese in this recipe. They’re pretty damn delicious. Especially when all melty. And yes – surprise! They actually melt (check out my mac and cheese recipe).
Best yet, they have 50% more calcium, just about the same amount of protein, half the fat, 35% fewer cals and no cholesterol or saturated fat. In fact, 1/3 of a cup only has 70 calories and 4g of fat.
HELLS YES.
I think everyone can find a way to love this recipe. If you don’t like sweet potatoes, then feel free to use a regular baking potato or even acorn squash.
Enjoy this recipe! If you end up making it, be sure to tag #ambitiouskitchen or @goveggiefoods on Instagram. I’d love to see your creation!
Vegetarian Black Bean Chili-Stuffed Sweet Potatoes
Ingredients
- 4 medium sweet potatoes
- 1 teaspoon olive oil
- 1 cup chopped yellow onion
- 1 red bell pepper, diced
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 1/2 tablespoons chili powder
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin
- 1/4 teaspoon chipotle chili powder or cayenne pepper, if you like a kick
- 1-15 ounce cans of black beans (do not drain)
- ¾ cup tomato sauce
- salt and pepper to taste
- ½ cup GO Veggie! Lactose Free Cheddar Shreds
- Cilantro, avocado and sour cream or greek yogurt for garnish
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Poke holes in sweet potatoes with a fork then place on foil-lined baking sheet. Roast potatoes in the oven for 40-50 minutes or until you can poke a fork or knife into the middle of the potato.
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While the sweet potatoes are roasting, prepare the chili by heating oil over medium-high heat. Add in onion, bell pepper and garlic; cook until onions soften about 6-8 minutes.
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Next mix in chili powder, oregano, cumin and chipotle chili powder or cayenne; stir for 1 minute. Mix in beans and tomato sauce.
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Bring chili to a boil, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until sweet potatoes are done cooking and chili thickens. Taste and season again with salt and pepper or additional spices.
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Once sweet potatoes are done, split them open. Place about 1/3-1/2 cup of chili in each potato then sprinkle with 2 tablespoons of cheese. (You will most likely have extra chili leftover which you can serve on the side.) If you’d like you can place them back in the oven for 5 minutes to help the cheese melt a bit. Sometimes I stir the cheese in with the black beans before I stuff the sweet potatoes - this ensures that the cheese gets ooey-gooey. Top potatoes with cilantro, avocado and greek yogurt or sour cream, if desired. Serves 4.
Recipe Notes
Feel free to use regular baking potatoes or an acorn squash instead of sweet potatoes.
If you'd like you can double or triple the chili recipe so that you have chili leftovers for the week. Or you can make extra and always freeze the leftover chili.
Chili recipe slightly adapted from Epicurious
Nutrition
Disclosure: This post was sponsored by GO Veggie! – however all options are my own and I love their lactose free shreds. Thanks for continuing to support Ambitious Kitchen and the brands I work with!
50 comments
Chili IN sweet potatoes? What kind of wizardry is going on in your kitchen, because I want in!
This sounds absolutely amazing. I am a chili addict too, so I am ALL IN. Pinned!
I LOVE potatoes stuffed with chili! Extra cilantron on mine : )
I freaking love chili too! And stuffed in potatoes sounds like the best idea ever. Yum!
This looks like a great change of pace from putting sweet potatoes IN chili (which is also fantastic, but variety is the spice of life, right?)! Thanks for suggesting the lactose-free cheddar shreds – I’ll have to keep an eye out of them!
We had regular potatoes with bbq lentils last night, but I had never thought of doing a chili and sweet potato combo…it’s on our menu for next week!!
That sounds delicious! Will you share your recipe?
Oh man I hear you on the value of freezer meals! Chili is the perfect food to get through the winter! And I love how well it freezes. I never thought to put it in a sweet potato (usually I put chopped sweet potato in the chili though). I’ll have to try it next time!
Yummy! I just made my first pot of chili from scratch this week. (Spicy turkey with beans.) I still have some, I should go put it on a potato (regular or sweet)!!! Next pot might be vegetarian 🙂
Thank you for helping me find a lactose-intolerant friendly cheese! Will definitely try this recipe soon 😛
These look AH-mazing. I have been on a huge sweet potato kick of late, and I will have to add these into my rotation!
Oh my, this is over the top! Delicious!
How can you say no to stuffed sweet potatoes!?!? I love them and this recipe looks awesome!
I loooooove chili. I especially love chili becuase of all the delicious toppings one get to on it. Yums.
Had this for dinner and it was SO GOOD! How have been missing out on this deliciousness my entire life?! Thank you so much!
Yay!
Yum! I cook for myself so I always eat leftovers for days. What a great way to reinvent chile!
Made this tonite for my husband and me. It was awesome! Very filling and quite flavorful. I chopped up a chipotle in adobo and it was nice and spicy. Some jalapenos might be nice too.
Made this last night and thought it was fabulous! I know this may sound strange, but I added cinnamon at the end as I was adjusting spices to taste. It’s a ‘secret ingredient’ I’ve had in other chilis (i.e. skyline). With this recipe, it does a splendid job of integrating the sweetness of the potato with the spicy cayenne. I also mashed the beans up a little bit with the back of a wooden spoon to give it a better consistency. Will definitely make again!
Oh yes, this looks great! It’s hot and summery right now but I think I’ll still have to give this a try — always in the mood for good, hearty comfort food, even in July. 🙂
Going to try this one out tonight!! Can’t wait. Are the nutrition values (calories etc) per serving?
Thank you so much I have bookmarked your page and keep preparing this very frequently in my house. This is absolutely every ones fav at my house for all special ocassions. Being Vegetarian, This chili is perfect.
One of my go-to favs; filling and delicious!
Yum – agreed!
Gross! What is that casein/sodium phosphate mix you’re putting on them? Buy some good quality European, well aged cheese if you have to have cheese and you can’t digest lactose.
I made this tonight because I had black beans and I had potatoes — and it was super-yummy. I added both the chipotle powder and the cayenne for a little kick. It was really flavorful and above all, easy. Thanks for the recipe!
Delicious! I love these a little spicy, too 🙂 Glad you enjoyed!
Yet so easily you can make this vegan! Looks great!
You bet! Enjoy 🙂
Made it, delicious, but was hungry two hours later. Darn it I want to be vegetarian but can never seem to eat enough to feel full. Maybe add some zucchini to this?
Feel free to add any variety of veggies to this!
This was a solid recipe!
Glad you liked it!
easy, vegetarian and perfect for fall!!
Wonderfully easy recipe to follow as well as eat. Didn’t have a pepper, so used frozen organic corn niblets- lovely taste with fair amount of heat.
Definitely a remake in the future👍
Perfect! Such a great dinner or easy lunch.
This recipe was so easy to follow and make! It had the right amount of spiciness and easy to find ingredients <3
So happy you enjoyed!
I’ve made this multiple times, very delicious, cheese, avocado and sour cream are a must!
Absolutely! Glad you love these!
I alternate cooking with my mother, so for a long while I was just browsing the entire world wide web for recipes. Then I seemed to end up on your website pretty frequently, so now it is my go to for meal ideas. It’s always iffy to try and find something both my parents will enjoy considering they have pretty conflicting tastes, but I was looking for a recipe that would let me use up the sweet potatoes we still had, so this seemed perfect, as I know they both like chili.
Now, my dad likes spicy food, and I like some spice as well, but my mother can’t have it, because it hurts her stomach. Because of how much chili powder goes into this I figured 1 tbsp would be enough to give it some basic flavor without being too much for my mother. I did add the quarter teaspoon of cayenne pepper because I figured “it’s so little, how hot can it be…”
Well, even with the 1 tbsp of chili powder instead of 1.5 it was slightly too spicy for my dad. It was still good, but unfortunately my mother couldn’t eat it. I ended up slathering my portion in Greek yogurt. So just a word of warning – this is HOT! I mean, I know that kind of comes with it being chili, but maybe I was used to my mother’s version, which is basically just beans in tomato sauce…
Anyway, thank you for the many tasty recipes on your website. My next three meals will come from here too!
Sorry to hear that, Logan! I would double check what brand of chili powder you have – I typically use McCormick, which is a very mild chili powder (and would not make this recipe super spicy). Let me know if you give it another try and hope you find more recipes here you like!
This recipe is exceptional. Making the chili from scratch was easy and well worth the small effort required. We served them with guacamole and sour cream. Off the hook!
Absolutely! Perfect dinner 🙂
This recipe was absolutely delicious! I have just finished it for dinner a few hours ago and I want more. I’ve never made chilli before so this was a first. I did this in a regular Maris Piper potato as I’m not a huge fan of sweet potatoes and it was still awesome! I love how everything is prepared and finished by the time the potato is finished cooking, so it was a really easy process. Thanks for the recipe!
Delicious! Glad you enjoyed!
This recipe was outstanding! Love the versatility and fact that it can be an easy weeknight vegetarian dish. It is also low cost, a plus in these food expensive times! I added a little extra tomato sauce to cut some of the heat. Monique’s recipes are our family favorites! Loved finding this hidden gem.
Quick and easy meal prep option! I opted to use all of the chili on top of the sweet potatoes to make them more filling! Also topped with avocado and greek yogurt as suggested! Yum!
I’m so glad you enjoyed them, Danielle!!