While you might think of a slow cooker as a kitchen tool only used to easily bake chicken, create meat sauces for pasta, or cook a tender beef stew, there are actually a number of easy, delicious vegetarian recipes that you can make in your slow cooker. Even better, you can throw all of your ingredients in the pot in the morning before you leave for work, and by the time you come home in the evening, you’ll have a delicious, hot, vegetarian meal ready to eat. The one thing you should keep in mind, though, is that vegetarian dishes do tend to cook faster than meat dishes, so you may want to buy a slow cooker with a built in timer so you can set it to turn on and start cooking a few hours before you plan to arrive home or one that will shut off and just keep your meal warm after a specified amount of time.

There are a number of easy, delicious vegetarian recipes that you can create in your slow cooker, including vegetable stews, vegetarian chili, soup, and amazing bean dishes, especially since there will be plenty of time for the beans to soften and cook to the appropriate consistency. And, as an added bonus, because of the additional amount of time the ingredients get to cook together, the flavors that are drawn out are tastier than what you can do in under an hour on the stovetop.

If you want to use your slow cooker to create easy, delicious vegetarian recipes, you don’t have to stick with soups, stews, and chilies. Instead, you can also create vegetarian casseroles, risottos, braised vegetables, and even desserts—like baked apples—in your slow cooker. One great vegetarian slow cooker recipe to try is red, green, or yellow bell peppers stuffed with rice, beans, and salsa. Remove the tops of the peppers and clean out the inside of the pepper, throwing out the seeds. Then, combine rice, kidney beans, salsa, chopped green onions, salt, and pepper, and spoon this mixture into the peppers. Place the tops of the peppers back on the peppers, and put the peppers into the slow cooker. Then, mix together diced or chopped tomatoes with cumin, sugar, salt, oregano, and some water, and spread this mixture around and on top of the peppers. Cover and cook for at least four hours. If you want to add something else to this dish, for the last thirty minutes of cooking, open up the peppers, sprinkle with your choice of shredded cheese, place the tops of the peppers back on the peppers, and finish cooking. If you make a big batch of this, you can even enjoy leftovers the next day for an even easier lunch or dinner. 

Don’t be afraid to experiment with your slow cooker to make different easy, delicious vegetarian recipes. Just remember that you need enough moisture inside of your slow cooker so your dish doesn’t dry out and become inedible. And, remember that you might need to add some additional salt or pepper at the end before you serve it, just in case you didn’t season it enough at the beginning.