Black Bean and Pumpkin Chili

I had a little trouble with this one, mentally. Apparently I am quite a bit more rigid in the way(s) I think about chili than I previously realized. It's not that I've never discounted the option of vegetarian chili as acceptable, I just... I don't know. I guess I just never was really on board with eating it. So I decided I would challenge myself and make myself make a vegan chili. It was weird for me, and I spent a lot of its cooking time posting on Facebook about how NOT sure I was about this. Was it really a chili? Or was it a chili flavoured stew? I still really don't know the answer to this question, since I'm still in the middle of my chilistential crisis, but I made it and we ate it and we liked it. So, stew or chili? No idea, but it was still good. We had ours with skillet cornbread, but I think rice would be optimal for this chili. Hope you enjoy!

1-2 cans of black beans, drained and rinsed (I made my from dry and it was somewhere in between this amount)
3/4 cup frozen corn
3/4 cup frozen and sliced okra
1 1/2 cup frozen cubes of pumpkin (I freeze these myself, but you could wait on this until pumpkin season)
1 can diced potatoes
1 can stewed tomatoes, broken up
1/4 cup dried onion
2 tablespoons dried minced garlic
4 tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon paprika
salt to taste
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasonings (don't ask)
6 ounces of beer (leaving the rest for you or another family member to drink!)
2 cups vegetable stock

Mix all but pumpkin (unless your pumpkin is from an uncooked, unfrozen pumpkin) together. Keep at a strong simmer for about 30 minutes. Add the pumpkin (unless you already did), and keep it at that same simmer for another 30-40 minutes, or until appropriately reduced. Serves 4-6.


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