Not Quite White Chili...

I have TONS of dried beans from WIC, and don't use them nearly often enough. They are healthy, inexpensive (even when we don't get them for free). They have no fat, are low in calories, and are rich in iron, protein, fiber, and all sorts of good healthy things. Plus they taste great! The catch - they take forever to cook!

The long cooking time isn't so bad if you cook things in a slow cooker. So I looked up on the Internet how to do beans in the slow cooker, and put together some beans this morning. By this evening, I had decided how I wanted to prepare them. I had ground turkey thawing in the fridge, and thought it would taste really good to cook that up and add it to the beans with some seasonings and make a chili-like concoction. It was a fairly successful culinary venture, even though I was the only one who could really enjoy it. Zaylee didn't care for it, I guess she's just not into chili. And Jeff, being sick, could only eat about 1/4 cup of it, and shouldn't even have had that much.

I said it was not quite white chili because, although it's made with white beans and turkey, it just isn't white! Oh well, it still tastes good.

Turkey White Bean Chili
1/2 lb. small white beans, sorted, rinsed, and soaked
A bunch of water (about 4 cups)
1/2 small onion
2 tbsp. minced garlic
1/2 lb. ground turkey
1/3 cup bean flour (dried beans, ground up in a wheat grinder. I added this as a thickener, so other thickeners could be substituted - flour, refried beans, etc.)
1-2 tbsp. chili powder
2 tsp. cumin
1 packet Sazon Goya (pink and orange box in Hispanic foods aisle)
Salt to taste

Place beans, onion, and garlic in slow cooker. Cover with water. Cook on high heat for lots of hours, until the beans are done. I think I had them in the cooker for about 6 hours or so.

Brown the ground turkey on the stove, then add to the beans. Whisk in the bean flour and seasonings. Heat through, and serve.Yield: about 5 cups
220 calories per cup