Stuffed peppers, tomatoes etc

Hi all

The wife an I love Mediterranean inspired food, that is to say whenever we've been on hols and enjoyed something, I (me being the one that can cook best out of the two of us) have made mental notes of what we had, and attempted to recreate it back home.

Today we had stuffed green peppers and stuffed tomatoes. It was superb. For anyone interested, this is what I did (quantities to your own individual taste):

*Boiled up some rice so it was nearly, but not quite cooked.
*Lightly fried some minced lamb in olive oil.
*Chopped up some spring onions, nasturtium stems and leaves, and fresh rosemary and added some dried dill and added to a mixing bowl. I also added a few peas.

After allowing the rice and the mince to cool a bit, I added these to the mix, about twice as much rice as mince.

Cut 'lids' off the green peppers and the toms. Get all the usual stuff out of the peppers and discard. Using a small spoon, hollow out the toms, putting what you scoop out into the rice mix. Mix it all up.

With the oven pre-heating to 200 degrees, I filled my now hollow peppers and toms with the mix, packing it nicely (but not squashing it). A little drizzle of olive goes in the top before you put the lids back on. Wrap them in foil, then bang them in the oven for about 30 to 40 minutes.

Get them out, put them on plates, and let them rest for a minute.

Serve with a nice glass of Merlot.

But I have a question. Apart from peppers and toms, what else can we stuff in this way?

 

Hmmmm, that one sounds nice. I might give that one a go sometime.

 

A couple more good suggestions there, thanks. On the aubs one, am I right in thinking you don't eat the aubergine skins? I don't use aubs very often so I'm not really sure if you're meant to eat the skins or not. I know (or hope) the skins are edible because I have added thinly sliced aubs to various pasta and rice dishes in the past.

 

hehe Clueless - they certainly are edible - without them the flesh starts to fall apart too. Just had some wonderful rattatoulle today, aubergines had the skins on and unlike other vege, the skin is not bitter at all.

I'd think in stuffed aubergines though, the skin would get a tad on the tough side......except the way it's done above they're on a bed of tomatoes and then covered, so should retain their moisture! One way to find out though----the recipe looks good, may give it a try myself!

 

I heard/read that the salt is just to leach out the bitter taste more than anything else.

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I think for most people, most fruit skins are ok, but the skin of some seemingly innocent everyday fruit can give you a bad belly if you eat too much of it or if you are intolerant. For example, the innocent old apple, whose skin is loaded with tannin which can lead to stomach cramps in excess, or the tomato, whose skin is responsible for one of the most common types of food intolerance. Fortunately for the wife and I we don't have any problem with food allergies or intolerances, but it is an interesting subject. A lass at work read a book once where the author claimed that the foods you liked or disliked, or which you found easy or hard to digest, gave clues about your ancestry. The idea being that if your ancestors came from an area that was abundant in one thing but not another, then it would be likely that you were built to eat it too. I'm not sure if there is any truth in that theory but it is interesting I think.

 

Stuffed peppers, have not made any in a couple years and the same for stuffed rolled cabbage.
To me its all about the sauce that is bubbles around it, got good sauce, and its right. The filling for me is raw ground lean meat, grated onion, grated garlic, salt, pepper, and raw rice. (I know some cook it ahead I don't) Then put the mixture in the green pepper or roll up in the cabbage and wedge tightly in the baking dish, pour sauce around it and bake--what it seem for ever. Frankly at this point, I don't know the sauce mixture I use. But being of that nationality of these dishes I know my mother has it written somewhere.
Good luck making it and enjoy.

 

I'm starving now.

 

I'm a vegetarian, so I eat a lot of veg stuffed, sauteed, you name it. I especially like stuffed yellow peppers with rice, olices and sundried tomatoes with loads of oregano and garlic.

Never tried stuffed tomatoes, wouldn't they just split and go mushy?

 

They would if you cooked them for too long, or on too high a heat. If you use those massive toms, and bake them wrapped in foil for 35 to 45 minutes they hold together nicely. Yes the toms themselves go soft, but they don't fall apart, and they serve mostly as flavour, the texture comes from whatever you've stuffed them with.

Give it a go, they are divine. Just substitue the meat with some firm textured veggy. Mushrooms, sweetcorn, asparagus, larger types of beans all spring to mind.

 

I do use couscous and bulgar wheat for the starchy element when I stuff peppers, they both take on flavour immensely well, I will give them a go.

 

Periwinkle, yep always with raw meat that way the juices from the raw meat mingle out into the sauce also, and also using the raw rice--then the raw rice sucks in all the good juices from the meat and the sauce from around it.
So starting from raw everything really works well, the only thing is you do have to grate the onion and garlic, the onion does not cook out well put in raw in chopped form, grated better.

Claire, have you ever tried pine nuts as part of the fillings for your veggies?

yeah, stuffed tomatoes, I only stuff them if I am going to put them under the broiler, forgot the stuffing right now that I use--it has been a while---guess cause I love them raw and simple the best.

 

I'd often wondered if it was right to cook the filling first. Part of me says it would give more flavour to leave it raw, but part of me wonders if it would cook effectively if it wasn't part cooked first. Not such an issue with veggy stuffings, but I'd be wary of adding raw meat in case it didn't thoroughly cook.

 

When I make cabbage rolls Clueless, I tend to cook the meat first, then mix it with the rice and other goodies. Because most of the time, the meat used in the 'stuffing' is a minced meat of some kind, there is more of a risk. I guess alot of it depends on the type of veg being stuffed, and the cooking times. Obviously if the stuffing isn't going to cook through until the vegetable is charred useless, or a soggy mess on the bottom of the pan, then cooking first might be a good idea. I have always cooked the meat first and as long as it is a minced meat, will continue to do so.

I do like the idea above about the cous cous and bulger wheat - and will give that a try sometime.

 

Ok--on that safer to eat--slightly cooked meat. I use it raw all the way. Never get sick. Still standing and live to tell about it.

 

LOL Redstar - you are right - as you cook it properly obviously! I know most family members at home cook it from raw - in stuffed vege, and in cabbage rolls etc. I think that with me having grown up in 'bbq country' in Australia - hamburger (or mince as they call it here) was something we were just very cautious about and I think it's more a mental block on me more than anything else that it has to be precooked! I've eaten loads of stuff too where it hasn't been cooked beforehand - and still here to tell as well In reality though - 'slightly cooking' it wouldn't make it any safer anyway......as the core temperature would still have to reach the same level as if it was raw in order to cook properly. Actually - there's a point - with meat thermometer you could actually be assured it was cooked thoroughly and save the time of precooking!