Stuffed Peppers

I finally did it. I tried stuffed peppers last night. This was, by far, the biggest risk I've taken in the veggie department. I really hate peppers. I typically hate the taste, the flavor, everything. But I was willing to try it.

I did, however, have a backup in case I absolutely hated them:

Totino's to the rescue!

Luckily, it didn't come to that!

Ingredients

• 2 cups water
• 1 cup uncooked white rice
• 3 large green bell peppers, halved and seeded (I used one green and one red because that's how it was packaged at the store)
• 1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef (I planned to use ground turkey, but since the grocery stores here stink, I used ground chicken instead since that's all they had yesterday)
• 1 onion, diced (As I've said before, I almost always omit the onion)
• garlic powder to taste
• salt to taste
• ground black pepper to taste
• 1 (15 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 cups finely shredded mozzarella cheese (I used an Italian blend of cheeses because that's what I already had in the fridge)

Directions

1. In a medium saucepan, bring water to a boil. Add rice and stir. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
3. Place green bell peppers in a medium saucepan with enough water to cover. Bring to a boil and cook for 10 minutes. Remove peppers from the water and set aside in a 9x13 inch baking dish.
4. In a large saucepan over medium heat, brown the ground beef; drain. Return to heat and mix in onion, cooked rice, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Pour in tomato sauce and mix thoroughly. Let simmer for about 10 minutes. Remove from heat.
5. Spoon the meat mixture onto each half of the green peppers. Bake in the preheated oven for 45 minutes or until mixture begins to turn golden brown.
6. Sprinkle mozzarella cheese over the top of each stuffed pepper. Return to the oven and bake until cheese is lightly browned, about 5 to 10 minutes.

First of all - pet peeve. Don't put directions in the ingredients. When I get ready to cook, I just look at the directions because I already have my ingredients together. Which led to me missing the part about halving and seeding the peppers. Which led to me wondering why it didn't seem quite right:

Then I figured it out. Duh.

I did some other modifications to the recipe. I added Cajun and Mediterranean spices because when I was taste-testing the rice/ground chicken/tomato sauce mixture, it just didn't have enough flavor for me. Obviously if I'd put the onion in, that might have taken care of it, but since I don't do onions, the spices did well. I think I could have even put more in.

The first few bites were just okay, but the more I ate, the more I liked it. I clearly made way too much though. The recipe calls for 3 and I only used 2...and I used a pound of ground chicken instead of a pound and a half. I could only eat one of the green pepper halves though so now I have 3 halves sitting in my fridge. I'm not willing to give up my chicken stir-fry for lunch so it might be dinner tonight again (why not, hubby's out of town until Sunday!).

So all in all, I give it a B. I'm not sure it will make it to my list of favorite foods but I would probably be willing to try another stuffed peppers recipe now. The green pepper taste wasn't as strong as I was expecting, which was a good thing.

Nutritional Information

Amount Per Serving  Calories: 465 | Total Fat: 20.3g | Cholesterol: 98mg

Asparagus Parmesan

Last night was my first attempt, ever, at making asparagus. I've had it in restaurants a few times and liked it well enough that I thought I could try it. I wasn't expecting to like it since I figure the restaurants had cooked it in a hundred pounds of butter and other fattening things. But I was willing to try.

As I'm prone to do, I omitted a few things from the original recipe - and you'll learn that I add along the way too (usually omitting things that aren't as good for me). I got my first borderline high blood pressure report at the doctor Friday so salt is pretty much out (not that I eat that much of it to begin with). The doctor and I are pretty sure it was a fluke - stress from school, work, and two family members in the hospital. But it's a definite concern with my genetics so I'm taking it seriously.

Asparagus Parmesan

Ingredients:
- 1 tablespoon butter (I used margarine)
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1 pound fresh asparagus spears, trimmed (no idea what "trimmed" means, but I cut off the bottom because it looked funny?)
- 3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese (I just used a handful)
- salt and pepper to taste (I completely omitted these)

Directions:
Melt margarine with olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add asparagus spears and cook, stirring occasionally for about 10 minutes, or to desired firmness. Drain off excess oil, and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese, salt & pepper.

Yeah, that's really it. Overall, it was good. I'd give it about a B overall. I think my asparagus was larger than normal and could have used a little longer cooking. Some of them were the perfect crispiness and some were just a little too hard. I think if I cut them up a little they would cook more evently. I still have half the bundle of asparagus left so I might try another recipe another day.

Calories: 199 | Total Fat: 17.5g | Cholesterol: 19mg