Italian Stuffed Peppers

Stuffed peppers were a dinner staple in my house growing up. They are an easy meal that doesn’t require a lot of ingredients and gets everything (veggie, starch and protein) all in one delicious package. When I started making them, hubby complained that they needed something else…like CHEESE (hey, we live in Wisconsin!). I modified my mom’s recipe a little to come up with this and they are delicious and easy!

Italian Stuffed Peppers

5-6 bell peppers (I use yellow, you can use whatever you like)

1 lb ground beef

1 c cooked rice

2 cans (14.5 oz) tomato sauce

½ med onion, chopped small

4 garlic cloves, peeled and minced

1.5 c Italian blend shredded cheese (whatever your grocery store has)

Mozzarella cheese, shredded

Preheat oven to 350.

Cut the top of the peppers and remove seeds. Set aside.

Brown ground beef, drain and set aside. Saute onion in olive oil until soft. Add garlic at the end and let soften briefly. Add browned beef and rice to mixture and stir to combine. Add 2/3-3/4 of a can of tomato sauce (until its well combined and wet, but not soupy). Add Italian blend cheese and mix well.

Scoop filling into peppers and place in a baking dish. Pour remaining tomato sauce (1 full can and ¼ of the used can) over the top of the peppers and into the baking dish.

Bake peppers until soft, about 1 ¼  hours. Remove from oven and top with mozzarella cheese and bake until cheese is melted. Serve over rice.

Slow cooker pulled pork

Both Hubby and I LOVE pulled pork sandwiches. I like mine memphis style with coleslaw on top and he likes his plain. Although this is not a traditional “barbequed” pulled pork, its yummy and ridiculously easy. I served it with waffle fries (frozen. I have a toddler. I like convenience).

Slow Cooker pulled pork

2 cans root beer

1 can cherry soda

2 lb pork tenderloin

Place pork tenderloin in slow cooker and cover with soda. Cook on low, 8 hours. Chop pork and mix with your favorite BBQ sauce.

Its really THAT easy and its SO good. It probably makes enough for 4-5 sandwiches, so if you have more than 3 or 4 people I would recommend doing 2 tenderloins.

The Omnivore’s Hundred

I came across this list at a blog I recently started reading, Reservations Not Required. The Omnivore’s Hundred is an interesting list of 100 items that Andrew Wheeler, co-author of the British food blog Very Good Taste, thinks every omnivore should try at least once in his life. He offered this list with the following instructions:

1. Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2. Bold all the items you’ve eaten
3. Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.
4. Optional extra: Post a comment here at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

Try it out!

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos Rancheros
4. Steak Tartar
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Clamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese (don’t ask, it was trickery)
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

First post! And….Sherried Tomato soup

Is it a good sign or a bad sign that my first recipe is jacked from another blog? Oh well. It is what it is.

I’ve been wanting to try The Pioneer Woman’s Sherried Tomato Soup for awhile now. I decided that mid-August was an excellent time to try a new soup recipe. Because hot and humid always mixes with soup, right?

Anyway, we liked it. It was tasty. The only problem was that it was too chunky. I think next time I’ll take my stick blender to it to smooth it out a little bit. It also makes A LOT of soup. Far more than hubby and I can eat, so I suggest that unless you’re making this for an army, you either freeze it before you add the sherry, cream and herbs, or cut down the recipe. Or plan to give away a jar to your neighbors, that works too.

Sherried Tomato Soup (modifications in bold)

6 tablespoons melted butter
1 medium onion, diced
1 46-ounce bottle or can tomato juice
2 14 ounce cans diced tomatoes
1 to 3 tablespoons chicken base ( I used 2)
3 to 6 tablespoons sugar (I used 4, depends on how sweet you want it)
Pinch of salt
Black Pepper
1 cup cooking sherry (1/2 cup was definitely enough)
1 1/2 cups heavy cream (1 cup is enough)
chopped fresh parsley
chopped fresh basil (left out, hubby doesn’t like basil)

Saute diced onions in butter until translucent. Add canned tomatoes. Add tomato juice, sugar, pinch of salt, and black pepper and stir. Bring to a near boil, then turn off heat. Add in sherry and cream and stir. Add in parsley and basil to taste, adjust other seasoning, and serve.

I chose to serve with grilled cheese, because grilled cheese and tomato soup are pretty much inseparable in our house. Can’t have one without the other. Here is a picture of the soup on the stove

and here is the soup in the bowl. Yum.

(Yes, I know my food photography sucks. Deal with it)

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