Easy Slow Cooker Turkey Chili
7 Comments Mar 25, 2024
Updated Jul 15, 2025
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This Slow Cooker Chipotle Turkey Chili is a fantastic chili recipe to try for game day or a lazy weekend meal! You won’t believe this recipe is healthy since it is packed with flavor.
If you have some leftover ground turkey, use it to make my Slow Cooker Turkey Meatloaf or Slow Cooker Turkey Meatballs.
Why This Crock Pot Turkey Chili Recipe Works
Ground turkey is one of the leanest meats you can buy, and the rest of the ingredients are either vegetables, beans, or spices. This healthy turkey chili recipe is a very lean and healthy meal that you will make repeatedly. Chili can have a long list of ingredients, but that’s what makes it good. Different flavors simmer all day to make one great taste.
This is the best turkey chili recipe to keep on hand for feeding a large family and especially for busy weeknights or weekends.
Recipe Ingredients
- Ground turkey – Find this near the chicken in the meat department; you can use any brand and it can have any percentage of fat. You can also use ground chicken and have the same results.
- Tomato products – This recipe has 3 kinds of canned tomato products, doing this makes a perfect chili. You will need diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, and tomato paste.
- Seasonings – No chili packet is used in this recipe! We are making our own custom chili seasoning out of chili powder, garlic powder, cumin, salt and pepper.
- Chipotle Peppers – These come in a can and are found on the Mexican food aisle. These are slightly spicy but add a great flavor to the chili that you can’t get with just chile powder.
- Beans – 2 cans of drained and rinsed pinto beans. We prefer pinto beans over kidney beans in this recipe.
- Vegetables – Onion and bell pepper and corn. Both frozen corn and canned corn hold up well in the slow cooker. Use whichever you prefer or have on hand.
Variations
- Jalapeno – Don’t like the taste of smokey peppers? Mince a whole jalapeno instead and add at the beginning of the cooking time. You can also add a touch of red chili flakes for heat.
- Shredded Chicken Chili – Use two large chicken breasts for this recipe and shred them right before serving.
- Beer Chili – Add an entire bottle of beer to this recipe instead of the water. Most of the alcohol flavor will cookout, though a slight beer flavor will remain.
Step-by-Step Directions
Step One: Add everything to the slow cooker.
Step Two: Pour in the water.
Step Three: Stir well, making sure the tomato paste disappears into the other sauces.
Step Four: Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours or on HIGH for 4 hours. Serve with desired toppings and enjoy!
How to Serve
- I make many different types of chili, and each is better with different toppings. Turkey chili goes great with these toppings: Shredded sharp white cheddar cheese, green onion, or diced red onions, corn bread muffins or hunks of cornrbread, Fritos corn chips or regular tortilla chips, or topped with diced avocado, sour cream minced jalapeno or a dash of hot sauce.
- If you’re looking for a simple option, serve your chili with a side of crackers or breadsticks for dipping or scooping.
- We love the leftovers of this chili! We usually eat it just as we had the day before or we pour the chili over chips and make nachos.
Recipe FAQs
These are smoked jalapenos that have a seasoned sauce. These peppers are very potent but I think have a great smoky flavor. The leftovers peppers and sauce can be put in the freezer. You can find this on the Mexican food aisle.
Ground chicken works excellent in chili. It browns very fast, so keep an eye on it.
Brown your meat along with the onion and bell pepper. Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 30-40 minutes. You may need to add more water as this simmers. You can also use a 6-quart or 8-quart instant pot. Using the saute feature, brown the meat. Add remaining ingredients. Make sure your valve is in the closed position. Pressure cook on HIGH for 15 minutes. Let the instant pot release pressure naturally.
You can put this meal in the freezer before cooking and thaw and cook when you are ready. Though this is a giant recipe, you will have to divide this between two bags.
Place cooled chili in an airtight container and place in the fridge for up to five days or freezer for up to three months.
Slow Cooker Turkey Chili Recipe
How to Video
Ingredients
- 2 lbs. lean ground turkey, browned and drained – can use ground chicken
- 30 oz. pinto beans (or black beans), drained and rinsed (two 15 oz. cans)
- 15 oz. can whole kernel corn , drained (or 1.5 cups frozen corn)
- 29 oz. diced tomatoes, (two 14.5 oz. cans)
- 15 oz. can tomato sauce
- 1 orange bell pepper, diced
- 1 small white onion, diced
- 1 chopped chipotle pepper, from 7-oz. can of chipotle in adobo
- 1 Tbsp. adobo sauce, from above can can
- 2 Tbsp. tomato paste
- 2 Tbsp. chili powder
- 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
- 1 tsp. salt
- 1/4 tsp. black pepper
- 1 1/2 cups water, (can use beer or chicken broth)
Instructions
- Add everything to the slow cooker. Stir well, making sure the tomato paste disappears into the other sauces.
- Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours or on HIGH for 4 hours.
- Serve and enjoy! My favorite way to serve is with fritos AND cornbread, but anyway you serve it is GOOD!
Sarah’s Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition info is auto-generated. This information is an estimate; if you are on a special diet, please use your own calculations.
Make one of these Slow Cooker Chili Recipes next:
Warm up with V8 Chili or classic Slow Cooker Cincinnati Chili for effortless comfort.
Fire up big beef flavor with hearty Steakhouse Chili. Or if you really like spice, try this creamy buffalo chicken chili.
Or go creamy with Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili—try the Wendy’s Chili recipe for a fast-food twist at home. For even more spice, try my buffalo chicken chili.
Could I just use ground beef instead?
Yes, that would work great!
Hey what kind of shredded cheese did you top for this recipe? Thanks
It is Tillamook sharp white cheddar.
Thanks for a very tasty sounding recipe! And thanks for not including any sugar in it. I love serving healthy food to my family!
For us non-americans. What is “tomato sauce”? Is it just plain tomatoes, or does it have any extra flavors/spices in it?
Tomato sauce is blended up tomatoes, no seasonings 🙂
Perfect, thanks 🙂