Stuffed Peppers with Fried Potatoes

I've never been a huge fan of green peppers, onion, or mushrooms. Growing up I would diligently pick out the little buggers from my food and pile them up on the side of my plate. It's strange though how when you get older your tastes change. I actually heard once that your taste buds continuously change throughout your life so what you might not have liked as a kid you might like as an adult and what you loved as a child just doesn't suit your fancy now that you're all grown up. I have got to completely agree with this. 

Over time as I expand my culinary adventures I've found myself using onions more and more, and even *gasp* appreciating the flavor they provide! What have I been missing all these years? So as my processes are changing in the kitchen I was recently given a stuffed pepper recipe from a co-worker. I politely thanked her but thought in the back of my mind that I would never make that. Stuffed peppers? hmm that's a lot of green pepper and even if I did make it, I probably wouldn't eat the pepper part, or at least very little of it, so what a waste. But, i decided to go for it because she claimed it was one of the few foods her son requested she make whenever he came home from college. Peppers were a buck a piece at one of the local grocery stores so for a couple of dollars I figured I'd give it a whirl. Every other ingredient is a pantry staple item so the only thing I needed was the peppers. I am SO glad I bit the bullet and made this. This recipe is definitely going in to my cookbook collection. Plus it was super easy so how can someone not like a tasty dish with minimal effort? I decided to serve this with sides of sweet corn and fried red potatoes.



First take your peppers and cut them in half. Clean and remove all the seeds. Place them in a large pot of salted boiling water allowing them to boil for 3 minutes. When the time is up remove from the water and let drain cut side down.

Next brown your ground beef. Since I'm only doing enough to serve 4 people I only used 8 oz of extra lean ground beef.

While your beef is browning you can get the rest of your ingredients together. In a large bowl combine 1/2 cup of tomato sauce, 1/4 tsp salt, 2 tsp chili powder, 1/2 tbsp of dehydrated onion flakes, and 3 oz of shredded cheddar cheese.

Next stir in a 1/2 of a cup of plain cooked white rice.

Then, add your hamburger.

Now comes the fun part of stuffing your peppers! It may seem like you have to much stuffing for the peppers but just smoosh it all in there trying to keep all peppers evenly filled. I did this by adding it one spoonful at a time until all the peppers are full. Place your peppers in a baking dish and add enough water to the dish to bring the level up to about a quarter of an inch. Bake your peppers for 15 minutes, no need to cover these bad boys.

Meanwhile, take 20 oz of red potatoes and chopped them up into bite size pieces. Twenty ounces for me came out to 4 potatoes.

Now that your 15 minutes are about up on the peppers, take them out for a moment and evenly distribute another ounce of the shredded cheese to the tops. Pop them back into the oven for another 15 minutes.

 
In a large skillet heat up 4 tbsp of extra light olive oil until it's smoking hot. Carefully toss in your potatoes and sprinkle with some onion powder, garlic powder, salt and pepper. I didn't measure these, just add to your own tastes. The best way I think to fry them up to a beautiful golden brown crisp is just to LET THEM BE! No stirring! I let mine sit for about 5 to 7 minutes until I give the pan a good toss to move about the potatoes, then let them sit a bit longer.