Doh! Stuffed Bell Peppers
Vegetarian friendly: Yes
Difficulty: Easy, so easy in fact that I managed to botch it!
Preparation time: 30 mins
Serves: 2 as a main course or 4 as a starter
Introduction
There are quite a few stuffed bell peppers recipes
out there but none of them have this little twist!
Ingredients
You'll also need salt, pepper and olive oil. Oh and some left over white wine2 wouldn't go amiss.
If you're a bit of a whiz in the kitchen you may wish to get the sauce and stuffing kicked off at the same time, but please don't try to do all the steps at once as this will result in being pointed and laughed at by small children. Otherwise feel free to do one step at a time.
Let's get ready to rumble! - Preheat the oven to 220c. Stick on your favourite cooking music (what do you mean you don't have any cooking music?) and lets see how quickly we can get ourselves rushed into ER requiring the reattachment of digits3!
Judo Chop! - Chop the bell peppers in halves, core and deseed them. If you've rinsed them out with water you may want to dry them out a little with some kitchen towel.
Whatever happened to Andrew Dice Clay? -
Chop the onion in half, set half aside and dice the other. Peel and dice the carrot. Dice the portobello mushroom. Peel the cloves of garlic and crush them in a garlic crusher (alternatively dice finely4). Slice the ball of mozzarella into eight pieces, try to resist the urge to slice of a piece for nibbling otherwise someone will feel cheated.
Sauce
Add a drop of olive oil to a medium sauce pan that has been sitting on a medium heat. Next break up the half of onion you didn't dice into the pot followed by three of crushed cloves of garlic and the dried chilli. Now add the tomato, and a corner of the veggie stock cube. Finally, a splash of white wine. Let the sauce simmer, you're looking for it to reduce and thicken. Once this has happened, remove any remaining pieces of onion, garlic or chilli and set aside for use later on.
Rice
Boil some water and add to a rice cooking pot (any pot so long as it's deep will do). Season the water with the remainder of the stock cube. Then add the rice. Once the rice is cooked, drain and set aside for consolidation with the rest of the stuffing.
Stuffing
Add a splash of olive oil to a frying pan which has been sitting on a medium heat. Add the diced onions and cook them until they're almost translucent. Next add the diced carrot and cook until they've started to soften, you don't want mushy but you also don't want crunchy raw. Then add the left over diced garlic and cook until brown. Next add the diced mushrooms, you're just looking to coat the 'shrooms with the other vegetable juices. Now add the cooked rice. Finally, stir in the sauce and go "DOH!"5
Assembly
Place the halved bell peppers on a baking tray. Fill each bell pepper with a generous amount of stuffing. Try to pack the stuffing in using your chosen filling implement. Cook the peppers for 25 to 30 minutes. Add a slice of mozzarella on top each bell pepper and cook for a further five to ten minutes.
Et voilà!
Light a candle, put on some sexy music and enjoy. You may wish to have a salad with a balsamic vinegar dressing to further add to your eating
pleasure.
Mad props go out to...
The cooking ninja - Culinary technical advisor.
The editorial bad ass mofo - Spel cheken an gramur an uder stuf an advise.
Footnotes
1 - A large flat field mushroom which is basically a matured version of your common garden variety Crimino mushroom.
2 - A rarity in some households.
3 - That's technical term for cutting the vegetables folks!
4 - Failing that just tell the garlic that it's over between you and it, the choice is yours.
5 - Yeap, that's the reason why it's called Doh! Stuffed Bell Peppers. The original recipe required that you pour the sauce on the plate and rest the stuffed bell peppers on top. Smacking of forehead is optional. | 
