I’m Claire Jones for Mushrooms Canada; today I’m going to be making a simple tasty dish called Italian Stuffed Peppers. It makes a great vegetarian entrée r it can be used as a side dish. First of all, take 2 peppers, I’m using red and yellow today, but you can use any color you like; green or orange would be nice too. Slice the peppers in half and just scoop out the seeds carefully. This recipe is a quick and easy dinner idea and it only takes 20 minutes to cook. It’s really colorful and has a wonderful flavor from the mushrooms.
Place the peppers in a shallow casserole or baking dish. First of all in a large skillet, over medium heat, heat 2 tablespoons of oil. After that, a quarter cup of chopped celery, and a quarter cup of chopped onion. Sauté this for 1 to 2 minutes, just until the onion and celery are softened, after this, a pound of chopped mushrooms. They need to be finely chopped. I’m using white button mushrooms and a brown Cromini mushrooms mixed together. You can use whatever variety of mushroom you like. Make sure they are really finely chopped so you can stuff the peppers with them. I use the food processor to chop them, it made a lot easier. Sauté this mixture just until the mushrooms start to turn brown, it takes about 3 to 4 minutes. Turn off the heat and add 4 cloves of chopped garlic. Then after that, a half cup of dried bread crumbs, a quarter cup of grated parmesan cheese, and a quarter cup of ketchup. Also add in 1 teaspoon each of dried basil and dries oregano, and mix this all together. You could also add a half a cup of chopped green or black olives to this if you wanted to. Then stir in, the recipe calls for a full cup of grated mozzarella cheese, I’m just adding the half a cup right now, and we’re going to use the other half a cup to top them later. Stir it all together and you’re ready to stuff your peppers.
Just take the mushroom mixture and spoon it into the peppers that you cut earlier. These are going to cook in a 400 degree Fahrenheit oven for between 15 to 18 minutes or until the peppers are just tender and cooked through. You could also cook this in the microwave. When you cook it in the microwave, after you stuff them, cover them with some plastic wrap and cook them on high power for between 5 and 8 minutes, again, until the peppers are just cooked through. Cook this in the oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for about 15 to 18 minutes or again, just until the peppers are tender and the mushroom mixture is cooked through. After the peppers have cooked for 15 to 18 minutes and they’re tender, just sprinkle the remaining half cup of mozzarella over the top, and then pop them back in the oven for 1 to 2 minutes or until the cheese has melted.
And here we have our Italian Stuffed Peppers. Remember, Canadian mushrooms are fresh, simple, good; you can always find information on storage, handling and some great recipe ideas at mushrooms.ca
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