September 7, 2020

Italian Stuffed Peppers

Name: Italian Stuffed Peppers
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 30 min
Total time: 1 h
Yield: 6
Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients: 3 medium bell peppers; 1 pound lean ground beef or turkey; 1 c. uncooked brown rice; 1 t. EVOO; 1 onion; 2 cloves of garlic; 1 14.5 oz can of tomato sauce; 1 t. parsley; 1 t. oregano; 1 t. basil; 1/4 t. salt; 1/4 t. pepper; 1/2 c. reduced fat shredded mozzarella

Jump to recipe

When coming up with recipe ideas for my blog this summer, I intended to share a bunch of recipes with ingredients from our garden. I have been anxiously waiting to plant a garden at our “new” house. Six years later and thanks to COVID, we finally had free time on our hands to make my dream garden a reality. After lots of planning and research, we had planted what we had thought was the perfect amount of vegetables and while we had a great harvest of tomato, zucchini and herbs….bell peppers left us disappointed. But only in the fact that we didn’t have an abundance from our garden to make our favorite Italian Stuffed Peppers.

Fortunately, the local farmer’s market didn’t suffer the same fate as us! So today I am here to share with you my recipe for Italian Stuffed Peppers. These Italian Stuffed Peppers are easy to make, can be prepped ahead of time to be cooked later and are loved by all, even if peppers aren’t their favorite vegetable. While the stuffing is delicious on its own, it is even better when the flavor of pepper is baked in.

But enough chit chat about gardens and peppers, that is deserving of its own post, here is a sneak peak at the deliciousness I baked up today.

Ingredients

Let’s begin with our ingredients: 6 medium bell peppers of your choice (I prefer any color except green), 1 pound of lean ground beef or turkey, 1 t. EVOO, 1 medium onion, 2 cloves garlic, 14.5 oz. can of tomato sauce, 1 t. parsley, 1 t. oregano, 1 t. basil, 1/4 t. salt, 1/4 t. black pepper, 1 c. uncooked brown rice, and 1/2 c. reduced fat shredded mozzarella.

Directions

Start by cooking 1 cup of rice according to package directions and preheat oven to 350 degrees. While rice is cooking chop the onion and garlic cloves. Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Add 1 t. EVOO, the chopped onion, garlic and ground meat. Season with salt, pepper, parsley, oregano and basil. Cook until meat is no longer pink. Reduce heat to low and add tomato sauce. Cook on low 10-15 minutes to allow flavors to come together.

While the rice and sauce mixture continue cooking, prep the peppers. Slice the peppers in half vertically, remove core and seeds. Lay the peppers cut side up in a large baking dish. When the rice has finished cooking, stir into the meat and sauce mixture. Now you are ready to spoon the mixture into the cut peppers. (Hint…I usually have leftover mixture, the kids will usually snack on this for lunch the next day.) Pour a little water in the bottom of the baking dish. Top each of the stuffed pepper halves with mozzarella.

Cover with foil. Bake in oven for 30 minutes. I like to check them after 30 minutes to make sure the pepper has softened. If the peppers are not tender, replace the cover and cook for a few minutes longer.

If you are crunched for time, you can make the stuffing a day or two ahead of time. Then the day of cooking, prepare and stuff the peppers. Either way they will bake perfectly and taste delicious! These make great leftovers too.

These Italian Stuffed Peppers are great any time of the year! And if you love Italian food as much as we do, check out a couple of my other favorite recipes for Sunday Sauce Meatballs or Eggplant Rollatini. Hopefully next year the peppers will come straight from my garden. Enjoy!

XO,