food friday: stuffed peppers

Welcome back to Food Friday! I haven't been posting recipes here for a while, but I think it's about time, don't you? Especially with recent developments in our family's health *cough* Nature Boy's high blood pressure and cholesterol *cough*. So now I'm trying to cook more at home and depend less on processed convenience food. Oh, and also use up the bounty of vegetables exploding out of our garden.

So for tonight I made stuffed peppers. It's a recipe I got from my friend Mel and I've been tweaking a little (sorry Mel... had to be done) to make it healthier. I've reduced the fat considerably by using ground venison, but you can use ground turkey if the wild stuff isn't available. I also use brown rice instead of white. This is also something really handy to make up the night before and throw in the fridge until you're ready.



Stuffed Peppers
6-8 sweet peppers, either halved or left whole with stem and seeds removed.
1 tbls. olive or canola oil
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped celery
Any leftover pepper pieces
1 lb. ground turkey or ground venison
Salt and pepper
Creole seasoning or seasoned salt, depending on how spicy you like it.
3 cups prepared brown rice. (Quinoa would probably work, too, but I haven't been able to get my family to try that yet.)
1 can diced low-sodium tomatoes, with juice, or 2-3 fresh tomatoes, diced.
1 can tomato soup
1/4 cup water
1 large can tomato sauce
Shredded low-fat cheese

In a large frying pan, cook onion, celery and spare pepper parts in olive oil over medium heat until translucent. Add ground meat and brown. Drain fat.

Add seasoning, tomotoes, tomato soup, water and rice to meat mixture. Bring to a boil.

Spray a large roaster with cooking spray. Fill peppers with stuffing mixture and lay inside the roaster. Place any extra mixture around the peppers. Pour tomato sauce over everything and cover with aluminum foil or roaster pan cover.

Bake at 325 for 45 minutes to 1 hour, until juice bubbles. Uncover and place cheese on top. Bake for another 10-15 minutes until cheese melts.

Makes about 6 servings.