Roasted Long Green Peppers Stuffed with Sausage, Served with Savory Rice (serves 4)

Last night I still had a surplus of lovely long green peppers given to me by my friend Tom, and, I was determined not to let them wither away in the fridge. My goal was to cook all 8 of them for dinner, so, the most logical thing to me was to leave them whole, stuff them with something and give each person two for dinner!

Roasted Long Green Peppers Stuffed with Sausage, served with Savory Rice

So, that is exactly what I did. I also happened to have 1 lb of sausage that was already seasoned with apple and onion, so I did not have to do anything but bung them into the blanched peppers. I had a lone long red pepper and a Vidalia onion so I simply sautéed them on the pan in some olive oil and mixed in some cooked perfume-y basmati rice. The whole dish was simple and extremely scarfable!

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For Sausage; You will Need: 1 lb flavored sausage, removed from casing (OR, 1 lb sweet or hot Italian sausage, or some other flavored sausage such as garlic, hot peppers…etc), 8 long skinny green peppers, (Anaheim peppers), or, 4 regular green peppers, 3 tbs extra-virgin olive oil

For the rice dish; you will Need: 2 1/2 cups rice for stove-top method, or, 3 cups rice using rice measure cup for rice-cooker method. Cook rice according to instructions. * NOTE – when cooking basmati rice I always find I get better results if I throughly rinse the rice with lots of cold water before I cook it. 1 long red pepper,( or 1 small red pepper, diced),  chopped, 1 medium Vidalia onion, 1/2 tsp sea-salt, freshly ground black pepper, 1/2 tsp ground cumin, 1/2 cup chicken broth, 3 tbs extra-virgin olive oil.

Preheat oven 350*

1 – Put the rice on.

2 – Cut the tops off of the peppers and remove the seeds and veins as best you can. Put a big pot of water on to boil. When it is boiling, add the peppers and cover. Cook for 4 minutes. Drain into a colander and set peppers on your counter top to cool.

clean peppers and blanch

3 – When cool enough to handle, gently stuff each pepper with sausage meat. Press in firmly until full. Lay peppers on a baking tray and pour the olive oil over everything. Rub in the oil with your hands.

Stuff with sausage meat and place on baking tray

4 – Place in preheat oven for around 45 minutes, but start checking after 40 minutes. (if you are cooking with regular green peppers, they may need up to an hour). They are cooked when a knife goes through a pepper easily. *While peppers are in oven, go to step 5.

Roast for 45 minutes @ 350*

5 – While the peppers are in the oven put a saute pan on medium/low heat and add the oil. Add the onions and peppers and cook for about 10 minutes. Add the seasonings and the 1/2 cup of chicken broth. Bring to a boil, then turn off heat.

6 – When rice is cooked, add to pan and stir everything together. Taste for further seasoning.

Lovely savory rice to go with the peppers

Serve stuffed peppers on a bed of fragrant rice. If the skin on the peppers is very papery, pull it off before eating. It comes away very easily. I found I didn’t mind the skin, but my daughter liked it better skinless.

This was a very delicious meal!