Stuffed Peppers - A Guest Post from my Cousin

I put the call out to some friends and family members for some guests posts. I've been a little swamped lately since going back to work after having most of the summer off. My cousin Tobe was the first to come to the rescue with Stuffed Peppers. Tobe doesn't have a blog but she loves to cook. She also guest starred in my post a few weeks back about Canning with Grandma. Without further ado...

Stuffed Peppers by Tobe

One of my fiancé's favourite Monday night football meals is "Stuffed Peppers". They are super easy to prepare and great to serve to all our hungry football fans. I decided to take a very basic stuffed peppers recipe and raise it a few notches to add some more flavour and take advantage of some fresh local ingredients.

I added 1 cup of shredded sharp white cheddar which gives a nice smokey flavour. Save a small handful to garnish the top; it makes a nice crusty gooey top on the peppers. If you can't fine sharp white cheddar, any cheddar will work. Instead if 2 cans of tomato sauce, I used 1 can and substituted the other for 1 jar of my Grandma's canned tomatoes. If you don't have canned tomatoes I would use 1 can of crushed tomatoes to give the sauce some texture. I combined organic ground beef and ground bison, instead of plain ground beef, to change the meat up a bit. Finally I added a few splashes of red wine to the meat mixture. It gave a little more depth and helped bring some more flavour to the dish.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup uncooked long grain wild rice
1 cup water
1/2 pound ground beef
1/2 pound ground bison
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tbsp red wine (few good splashes)
6 green bell peppers
1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 (8 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp onion powder
1 tsp Italian seasoning
salt and pepper to taste
1 cup shredded sharp white cheddar (1/4 cup reserved for garnish)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Place the rice and water in a saucepan, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and cook 20 minutes.

3. In a skillet over medium heat, add meats, red wine and Worcestershire sauce and cook the beef and bison until evenly browned.

4. Rinse bell peppers and remove and discard the tops, seeds, and membranes. Arrange peppers in a baking dish with the hollowed sides facing upward. Slice the bottoms of the peppers if necessary so that they will stand upright.

5. In a bowl, mix the browned beef and bison, cooked rice, 1 can tomato sauce, 1 can crushes tomatoes, garlic powder, onion powder, cheese, salt, and pepper. Spoon an equal amount of the mixture into each hollowed pepper. Mix the remaining tomato sauce and Italian seasoning in a bowl, and pour over the stuffed peppers.

6. Bake 1 hour in the preheated oven, basting with sauce every 15 minutes, until the peppers are tender. During last 20 minutes of baking, top with remaining cheese.

Enjoy with a side salad and some hot crusty bread!