Spicy Garbanzos

You guys! I made this recipe twice in the last two weeks. But did I manage to take even one picture of it? Noooooooo. Of course not. Even though I knew I was going to want to write about it here. Even though I knew I was going to want to write about it here this week.

Sigh. Yes, that's what it's been like around here lately.

And so, for my penance, I'm going to give you more bang for your blogging buck and provide you with not one but two sorta-different versions of this recipe. The first is from the Weight Watchers Fast & Fabulous Cookbook; I used to make all it the time back some years ago when I was doing Weight Watchers online and found this book down in my mother's basement. I continued to make it long after I'd stopped doing Weight Watchers online (or anywhere else), because I loved it so much.

And then there's the second version, the one I "created" just last week when I realized I needed a quick, easy, slow-cooker-based vegetarian potluck recipe using the ingredients I had around the house. It was--if I do say so mayself--even better than the original. Or, at least, definitely just as good. But I warn you: It may be the world's least precise recipe ever.

So let's start with the one that uses measurements and such. You know, the one written by real recipe writers, and not harried mothers.

Weight Watchers' Spicy Garbanzos

1 teaspoon vegetable oil
1/4 cup diced onion
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 cup chopped green bell peper
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/8 teaspoon ground cumin
3/4 cup canned crushed tomatoes
1/2 cup water
Dash of hot sauce
12 ounces drained canned garbanzo beans
1/8 teaspoon each salt and pepper

1. Heat oil in saucepan; add onion and garlic, and saute until onion is softened.

2. Add green pepper; saute for five minutes longer.

3. Stir in chili powder and cumin.

4. Add tomatoes, water, and hot sauce; cover and let simmer for 10 minutes.

5. Stir in garbanzo beans, salt, and pepper, and let simmer, uncovered, until beans are heated through and sauce is slightly thickened, about 10 minutes longer.

Couldn't be easier, right? Wrong! This is easier.

TC's Slow-Cooked, Perfect-for-a-Potluck Spicy Garbanzos

3 cans of garbanzo beans (or more...or fewer...depends on how many people you want to feed)
1 big can of diced or whole tomatoes (whatever you have in your pantry)
Frozen corn
About a teaspoon or so of minced or chopped garlic (I use the premade stuff in a jar that I keep in the fridge for when I don't have time to chop and/or mince)
Chili powder
Ground cumin
Ground coriander (because I have a baggie full of coriander I ground myself from cilantro that went to seed in my garden; it's been in my freezer for I-don't-want-to-say-how-long, and I use it in whatever recipe could possibly support it; this one supports it nicely)
Hot sauce (my husband's all about the sriracha these days, so that's what I have on hand)
Salt (I use kosher in pretty much all my cooking)
Freshly ground pepper

1. Drain the garbanzo beans; throw them into the slow cooker.

2. Open the tomatoes; throw them into the slow cooker.

3. Dump a bunch of frozen corn into the slow cooker. I have literally no idea how much; I do it by eye, stirring the stuff around until it looks right.

4. Add the garlic, chili, cumin, coriander, hot sauce, salt and papper. Again, I do this entirely by eye--or maybe I should say by feel. I know I like a lot of cumin and coriander, for instance, and enough pepper so that you can taste it. I know that you need more kosher salt than you'd think, but that too much is not good. I know that my husband will add more hot sauce, so I don't have to overdo. That sort of thing.

5. If the whole mixture looks dry, add a little bit of water; you don't need much water when you're cooking in a slow cooker, though.

6. Cook on high for no more than three hours, if that long.

7. When I go to a potluck, I just take it in the crockery part of the slow cooker with me, and I'm done with it. When I serve it to myself at home, I like to put it over brown rice or sticky sushi rice...or, really, whatever leftover rice I have around so I don't have to go to the trouble of firing up the rice cooker. I'm all about the lazy.

I made these substitutions, by the way, so that I don't have to do any real prep work--no dicing or slicing needed. In fact, one of the potlucks I brought this to was at my workplace; I threw all the ingredients into the slow cooker in the morning in under five minutes, put the whole thing in my car, and plugged it in in my friend's office--where it cooked all morning long and was absolutely perfect when lunchtime rolled around.

So now I feel comfortable saying that it could not be easier. Also? It could not be more delicious.