White beans and green chile is a weeknight pot. Two cans, half a jar of chile, forty minutes start to finish, and it feeds four to six with leftovers that are better the next day. It is vegan as written, and it takes almost nothing on faith.

The one real decision is how thick you want it, and you make it twice: once when you pour the stock, and once at the end with a blender.

How thick do you want it

There is no flour in this pot and no roux. Everything holding it together comes out of the beans themselves, which is worth knowing because it means you control the texture completely.

Three cups of stock gives you something you can eat with a fork. Four gives you a brothy soup. Both are good. Decide before you pour, because it is easier to thin a thick pot than to thicken a loose one.

Then blend two cups near the end and stir it back in. Ladle it out, let it sit a minute so it does not build steam pressure in the blender, blend until completely smooth, and return it to the pot. This is the step that turns beans sitting in broth into a bowl of chili, and it is the one most recipes are too timid about.

A potato masher works too. Press a cup or so of the beans against the side of the pot. Less smooth, faster, one fewer thing to wash. An immersion blender in short pulses is fine as well, though it is easy to go too far and end up with a uniform puree, which is a different and lesser dish.

One more lever if you want it: keep the liquid from one can of beans. Draining and rinsing both gives you a cleaner flavor. Tipping one in liquid and all gives you free starch.

Bloom the cumin in the oil

The cumin goes in with the garlic, before any liquid, and that order is doing real work. Cumin's aroma compounds dissolve in fat rather than water, so thirty to sixty seconds in hot oil gets more out of a teaspoon than a tablespoon stirred into broth ever will.

Keep it moving. Garlic and ground spice catch quickly, and burnt cumin is bitter all the way through the pot with no way back. Get the stock in as soon as it smells strong.

The same goes for anything else you add in that window. Oregano, coriander, a pinch of smoked paprika: all of them in with the cumin rather than later.

Three things that make it taste finished

Onion, garlic, cumin, white pepper and salt is a deliberately quiet base that lets the chile lead. Three small additions take it from good to the version you make on purpose again, and none of them change what the dish is.

Dried oregano, half a teaspoon, in with the cumin. Mexican oregano if you can find it, which is more citrusy and less minty than the Mediterranean kind and is what belongs in southwestern cooking. Biggest improvement for the least effort.

Lime at the end, off the heat. Half a lime for the pot. Everything in this bowl is soft and round, and there is nothing sharp to push against it. Acid is what gives a long simmered bean dish edges. Add it after the heat is off, because acid dulls as it cooks.

Something dairy, if you want it, in the bowl. A spoon of sour cream, a splash of cream at the end, or a handful of Monterey Jack stirred through until it melts. Dairy in a white chili is traditional and it rounds out the heat. Leave it out and the dish stays fully vegan, which is useful if you are feeding a table with mixed requirements.

Garnishes that earn their place: cilantro, sliced radish for crunch, crushed tortilla chips, avocado, a few pickled onions.

When the chile goes in

Half a cup of roasted green chile for four to six servings is a moderate amount, and it is the only assertive thing in the pot, so where it lands matters.

Split it. Half in with the beans, where twenty minutes of simmering pulls the chile flavor through the broth. Half at the end, off the heat, where it keeps the roasted character that long cooking flattens. Roasted chile has already been cooked once over flame, and boiling it for twenty minutes dulls the part you bought it for.

No need to drain it here. This is one of the few recipes where the liquid the chile carries is welcome, because it is going into a broth rather than a batter. If you are using frozen chile, thaw it and tip the lot in.

Salt last. Vegetable stocks vary enormously in how salty they are, and this pot reduces as it simmers. Season at the end, after the lime, when what is in the pot is what you are eating.

Medium chile at half a cup in a batch this size is mild. If you want the chile to be the reason people remember the bowl, use Hot, or take the Medium up to three quarters of a cup. There is no dairy in the base to buffer it, so heat reads more directly here than it does in a queso or a mac and cheese.

Storing and freezing

Refrigerator: 3 to 4 days, per USDA guidance for cooked leftovers, cooled and covered within two hours. It thickens overnight as the beans keep absorbing, and most people think the second day is better.

It freezes very well, up to about three months. No dairy and no pasta in the base means nothing in it breaks or goes grainy. That makes this one of the better things in the archive to double. Freeze it flat in bags, thaw in the fridge overnight.

Freeze it before you add dairy if you are adding dairy. Cream and sour cream separate on thawing. Put them in the bowl when you reheat.

Reheat gently and expect to loosen it. Stock or water, a low flame, stirring.

If it came out thin

Easy to fix, and you can do it after the fact.

Blend more of it. Two cups rather than one, returned to the pot. If you already blended two, do another cup.

Or simmer it uncovered for another fifteen minutes. Twenty minutes is the minimum for the flavors to come together. Thirty five with the lid off reduces the broth and concentrates everything in it.

Or just wait. It thickens overnight on its own.

If it tastes flat rather than thin, it is almost always missing acid. Squeeze in the other half of that lime, off the heat, and taste again before you reach for more salt.

What to serve with it

Something to dip. Green chile cheddar biscuits are the obvious answer, and cheddar and green chile spoon bread is the better one if you have forty minutes and a spoon.

If you want the version with meat in it, New Mexico green chile stew is the dish this one is quietly modeled on, with pork and potatoes doing what the beans do here. It is also a good reminder of the distinction: chile with an e is the pepper, chili with an i is the pot. This recipe has both.

The chile is 16 oz jars of flame roasted Hatch green chile, Medium or Hot, four ingredients: Hatch chile, salt, garlic, lime juice. Half a cup a batch means a jar makes four pots. If you cook beans and stews at volume, frozen in 5 lb bags is the same chile without the jars, and the substitutions guide covers what to use if Hatch chile is not something you can get where you live. The rest of the recipe archive is free.

Common questions

How much stock should I use?

Three cups gives you something thick enough to eat with a fork. Four gives a brothy soup. Decide before you pour, because thinning is easier than thickening.

Why is my white bean chili watery?

Not enough of the beans were broken down, or there was too much stock. Blend two cups and stir it back in, mash a cup against the side of the pot, or simmer uncovered for another fifteen minutes.

How do I thicken it without flour?

Use the beans. Blending or mashing part of the pot releases their starch, which is the only thickener the recipe needs. Keeping the liquid from one can of beans adds more.

Why add the cumin to the oil instead of the liquid?

Cumin's flavor compounds are fat soluble. Thirty to sixty seconds in hot oil extracts far more than the same amount stirred into stock. Watch it closely, because burnt ground spice cannot be fixed.

What is missing from most white bean chili?

Acid and oregano. Half a teaspoon of dried oregano with the cumin and half a lime squeezed in off the heat do more than any other two additions.

Is this recipe vegan?

Yes as written, with vegetable stock and no dairy. Sour cream, cream or cheese are optional finishes you add in the bowl.

Can I freeze it?

Yes, about three months, and it freezes better than most things because there is no dairy or pasta in the base. Freeze it before adding any cream, and loosen it with stock when you reheat.

How spicy is it?

Mild with half a cup of Medium chile. There is no dairy in the base to soften heat, so Hot chile reads more directly here than it would in a cheese dish.

The short version

Three cups of stock if you want it thick, four if you want soup. Bloom the cumin and a half teaspoon of oregano in the oil. Half the chile in early, half at the end. Blend two cups and return them. Lime off the heat, then salt. Dairy in the bowl, or not at all.