Here is my crockpot version of Algerian Chili which can be found several places on the net - eg.
http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/15/Algerian_Chili18936.shtml and others, such as:
http://www.gourmet.gr/recipes/algerian/1/26/5377/Algerian-chili.htm
http://www.vegan-food.net/recipe/1148/Algerian-Chili-Loubia-B-Dersa/
It was recently offered to a group I own on Yahoo! and was immediately popular. Perhaps it was the name 'Chili' attached to an Algerian dish rather than Mexidan, although it is good to remind that 'chili' in both names refers to the spice itself, not to the whole recipe. What it is, of course, is a white bean stew with lots of wonderful flavour and 'heat' - depending on how much of the latter you like.
What I did, apart from omitting oil and salt from the recipe, was to put the whole lot at once into a crockpot, with the exception of half of the herbs (and I used half cilantro and half parsley). The rest I added right near the very end of cooking. I also used canned tomatoes, but that would make little difference, I think - except that next time I'd hold back from putting them in until after the beans had had a chance to become soft LOL - I forgot myself in my hurry, so the beans took forever to cook! Other changes were minor.
Here it is all dished up ready to go on the table with a bowl of couscous. We had started with a salad, so apart from a little fruit to follow this was our main meal.
While the dish does resemble Mexican-style 'Chili', the differences here are sufficient to recommend it be tried by anyone who loves spicy food - although you can adjust that to suit yourself, obviously.
There was far too much for two little people, so I divided it up and froze some. It reheats nicely too! Just add more parsley, cilantro, whatever you have to give it a nice fresh taste ;)
Definitely a winner. We'll be making this again!
