Stuffed Bell Peppers - Video Recipe

My colorful and easy-to-make recipe uses Bell Peppers stuffed with a couple sauteed veggies, some uncooked rice, and ground meat.

I guess you can call this a Meatloaf wrapped in Bell Pepper. Roasted, Bell Peppers are tender, tasty, and almost sweet. This is a light meal if you use ground turkey or chicken.

When you bake the covered Stuffed Bell Peppers for an hour and a half, they steam uncooked rice until tender. The rice plumps up and absorbs surrounding flavors for a delicious entree.

I like to bake a few at a time to freeze for later. Serve one of them with a favorite side and you have a satisfying meal. Or just eat one on its own as there is plenty of protein, veggies, and carbs, all in one bite!

I often find Bell Peppers on sale at regular grocery stores, and especially at my local Latin market.

Red, yellow and orange Bell Peppers usually cost more for some reason. I usually make this recipe with cheaper green bell peppers, but this time I went for it to introduce color into my video recipe.

Raphs Grocery Store

Superior Grocers

To stuff a Bell Pepper I slice around the stem and pull off the top. Most of the seeds will come out. If needed slice out any that hold on to the interior. I also cut away the white part of the inside "ribs." It doesn't have to be perfect, just remove most of the seeds and top stem.

You can use any color on sale. Red, orange or yellow Bell Peppers are a little sweeter than green ones. But anytime you roast or saute a bell pepper it will sweeten up, even green ones.

The most expensive items are mushrooms and ground meat. But even these come on sale from time to time. Ground meat, I can freeze and defrost when mushroom shows up at my local 99c only Stores.

I even find small amounts of ground meat (let's say for one or two Stuffed Bell Peppers) at my local Dollar Tree. You can use low-fat ground turkey or chicken.

Click on any photo to see larger. 

Mushroom are almost always at my local 99c only Stores. They come in 4 or 5-ounce packages. You could just pick out a couple of whole mushrooms from your fave grocery store. Add more or less or just leave them out. The sauteed onion and garlic with rice are enough stuffing.

Rice is cheap at any store, you can use white, brown or any type you can find on sale. If you have leftover cooked rice then use that.

I add an egg or two and a little milk to dampen the stuffing, so the raw rice will steam tender. The main thing when baking Stuffed Bell Peppers are to cover them well, so the rice will cook through without drying out.

You will have a few crunchy rice kernels on top of Stuffed Bell Peppers, but that's okay, it's just a little extra texture. But you can be sure the interior will have cooked and flavorful rice. If you have leftover cooked rice it's okay to use it, too.

My latest video recipe is a favorite of mine and I make it when bell peppers and ground meat comes on sale. It's an easy and cheap way to extend more and more expensive ground protein. So make a batch of my Stuffed Bell Peppers, and go ahead a freeze them for later, too.

Stuffed Bell Peppers - Video

Play it here, video runs 3 minutes, 17 seconds.

My YouTube video link for viewing or embedding, just click here.

Ingredients (1 or 2 per serving)

• 1 pound ground beef, pork, turkey or chicken.
• 4 to 5 bell peppers - medium to large any color. Green Bell Peppers are cheapest.
• Mushrooms sliced - a small package of about 5 ounces. Okay to use any type mushrooms you like. 
• 1/2 cup rice - okay to use 1 cup cooked rice.
• 1/2 onion - chopped
• 1 large egg - or 2 small eggs.
• Worcestershire Sauce 1 teaspoon - optional. Okay to use Soy Sauce. 
•  Garlic 1 teaspoon - chopped, from the jar, fresh or even dried.
• 1/4 cup milk - cream or favorite broth.
•  Black Pepper to taste - Worcestershire and Soy Sauce have enough salt for me.

Directions
Slice onion and mushrooms. I use garlic from a jar, so it's ready to cook, okay to use fresh garlic.

Add a little oil to a frying pan and saute chopped onion until soft, about 5 minutes. Next, add the sliced mushrooms and saute another 5 minutes, stirring. Finally, add garlic and saute for just a minute.

In a large bowl add the raw ground meat. Add sauteed veggies, uncooked rice, one or two eggs, and milk or broth.

Season with black pepper, I find Worcestershire Sauce and Soy Sauce are salty enough. Mix all the ingredients together. This is the stuffing for Bell Peppers.

 I used four to five large Bell Peppers. Depending on the size, I find that is enough with one pound of ground meat. Mainly you want to make sure all the Bell Peppers will fit in a covered baking dish. You can use a pan, just make sure to wrap or cover the peppers with foil.

 While you are sauteing veggies you can prepare the Bell Peppers.

To stuff a Bell Pepper, I slice around the stem and pull off the top. Most of the seeds will come out. If needed slice out any that hold on to the interior. I also cut away the white part of the inside "ribs." It doesn't have to be perfect, just remove most of the seeds and top stem.

Fill up Bell Peppers with the sauteed veggies and ground meat. If you have any leftover stuffing you can wrap it in foil and freeze for later, or just wrap it in foil and bake it with Bell Peppers, kinda like a Meatloaf.

Cover the Stuffed Bell Peppers and bake for 1 1/2 hours (90 minutes) at 350 degrees.

That's it, just remove from oven when done. I let them sit covered for 5 minutes or so to cool down a little.

My Morning Coffee With Pepperoni - Video

I like my first groggy-eyed cup of coffee with pepperoni. Just read on to see what I mean.

This seems to be an ongoing problem in the Cheap$kate Kitchen. You can see how I've dealt with this conundrum before by clicking here. And, I'm sure it will happen again!

No fresh ground Starbucks left, maybe there's some old Folgers in the can way back in the cupboard. None left in the can, how about a couple of spoonfuls of freeze dried? No freeze dried, either...so how low can I go?

Along with my desperate search for coffee grounds, I run across the remnants of the previous evenings' dinner, Pizza with Pepperoni. I am the thin crust type with loads of melty and stringy molten cheese.

And I have a few easy Pizza Recipes, that use precooked crusts you should try out sometime. I even have one with an egg!

Now, what heck does Pepperoni Pizza have to do with my first cup of coffee?

Well, just watch the Caffeinated Chef in action and you'll see what I mean!

My Morning Coffee with Pepperoni - Video

Play it here. video runs 1 minute 26 seconds.

My YouTube video link for viewing or embedding, just click here.

Happy Birthday Mom ! - Mom's Favorite Recipes

Mom turnes 85 years young today.

And I owe it all to her, at least where I get my cooking chops (and any good sense I have.) Just check out our cooking videos below to see what I mean.

She grew up in Texas on the Gulf Coast, in a small shrimping town called Port O'Connor. There, I learned to love seafood.

Her father was a shrimp boat captain. So, while we couldn't afford steak, we had all the fresh caught seafood Big Daddy would skim off the top of the catch. Shrimp season was short, but crab and oyster season soon followed.

Big Daddy & Big Mama

Mom had movie star looks (like a young Elizabeth Taylor) and smarts, and a scholarship to college if she wanted it, but had no extra help from her parents.

So after high school graduation, she was soon married and I arrived on the scene, followed by my brother and sister.

Billy, Berry and Brenda

My Dad was in the military so we moved around. Mom and us kids eventually settled back in Port O'Connor, after a divorce. Dad was quite a character and the life of the party, but he was also a little too profligate in the alcohol consumption department.

Billy Doyle Robinson

Mom went back to work as a waitress, so I learned how to literally pinch pennies when she poured handfuls of customer tips on the kitchen table for us kids to separate and count.

Mom got back on her feet and found love again with this shuffleboard-playing fellow below, Ken.

Click on any photo to see larger.

After a couple years, Mom remarried and a final sister, Denise, was born (catch up with my youngest sister Denise's Eggplant Recipe, video here.)

Denise & Radish

We moved to neighboring Louisiana the year I enrolled in Junior High School. There she picked up a whole other way of cooking, Cajun-style.

My high school daze were spent in Gonzales, Louisiana, the self-professed Jambalaya Capital of the World. So you know this town is serious about chow. Click here to see a culinary video tour of some local Cajun cuisine at the weekend Flea Market, including: Crawfish Pie, Boudin Balls and, of course, Jambalaya.

And here's our first video we made together in my Los Angeles kitchen - and my late wife, Amy, even makes an appearance at the very end of the video. You'll get a kick out of Mom rockin' the cast iron kettle. I make her Cajun Jambalaya more than any other recipe - it's simply delicious.



Here is a link to her Jambalaya recipe with text and yummy photos.

Mom was always popular with my high school buddies...especially during lunch or dinner time. She brought her Tex-Mex Enchiladas to Cajun Country, and my Louisiana friend Marvin ate them up!

Me, Marvin & Dennis

During my last visit to Louisiana, I had him over when I filmed Mom making Tex-Mex Enchilidas. Marvin liked the Enchiladas so much, he had a flashback to our high school daze.

Make sure to watch my wacky recipe video to the end, that's when our flashback hijinx really get to smoking (wink, nudge.)



Mom takes a star turn with her next video recipe, her popular Chicken and Sausage Gumbo.

It's a traditional Southern dish and its cheap, too. Just chicken, sausage and the Cajun veggie trinity of bell pepper, celery and onion. What gives Gumbo it's unique taste is a dark brown roux, which is flour cooked in oil until chocolate brown.

Just check out the video below - Mom will take you through the steps. And, as an added bonus, my oldest sister Brenda makes a nagging appearance a few minutes in.



Click here to read all about making Mom's homemade Gumbo, from roux to rice!

My Mom's Cajun Potato Salad is the perfect side to her Gumbo and Jambalaya. When she visited me in Los Angeles I got her to do it on camera. I couldn't help but give her a hard time about the recipe. I called it Cajun Mashed Potatoes and she called it Cajun Potato Salad - well, I guess you'll have to watch the video below to see who wins that argument!

I satiate my sweet tooth during visits with Mom. And the best of her pastry delights are Mini-Pecan Pies. If I couldn't make it for the Christmas holiday, then she would send a shoe-boxed size package with a dozen of these tasty pies.

In the video below, Mom attracts a kitchen-full of hungry relatives when these pies come hot out of the oven. And it's a miracle they were done right, because this Chef de Shutterbug was shoving a camera in her face (and a hot oven) during the whole procedure. We butted heads a few times, but fortunately, it all turned out fine.

I even came up with a way to dodge the high prices for pecans - so check out the video below to learn my budget secrets.

And click here to see Mom's Mini-Pecan Pies recipe with text and tasty photos.

Mom has lived half her life in Gonzales, Louisiana. My last vacation visit there fell on Christmas, and she pulled out all the stops with a huge holiday spread, that included Pumpkin Pie. I got her on video making it, and it turned out perfect, as you will see below.

The recipe is a traditional one made with simple ingredients. The pumpkin came from a can, but the crust was handmade with wheat flour.



All the easy-to-follow steps are written out here, and with delish photos, too.

Now, Mom is no angel -- hey, who is? Recently my brother from another daddy, the Swamp Chef, with his Spanish moss and all.

When I asked Mom: "Who's the Swamp Chef's daddy?" Her reply was: "That's a very good question!" I guess Mom will spill the beans one day, until then, check out the video below for a dessert good enough to cajole the Swamp Chef out of the bayou!

Cherry Pie - Recipe Video

In Louisiana there are fast food drive-thru's serving slushy Daiquiris. I don't know how the heck they get away with it. Every time I go back to visit my Mom and Sis, I am reminded about this quirky Cajun roadside icy, thirst quenching, to-go cup.

Now, there are rules to this. Louisiana has an open container liquor law. So, when you get your Daiquiri, as both Mom and Sis reminded me several times: "Do not put the straw in!" That is a DUI violation if you are stopped. However parched you are, resist plunging the straw through the drink top -- until you get home. Fortunately, Mom's house was less than 5 minutes away.

Check out my last video below, and ride along with my sister Brenda and Mom for a cool beverage on a hot Louisiana summer day.

Happy Birthday Mom -- I love you !

Halloween Recipes- Creepy Cool Meat

Gory Halloween warning! Time to get squeamish with the Ghoulish Gourmet's creepy imagery of raw meat and viscera. I'm about to git medieval for Halloween and the following weeks Dia del los Muertos or Day of the Dead.

This Sinister Cheap$kate's ghastly recipes are laid out like a bloody scene from a Stephen King and Edgar Allen Poe story. Once you've digested this macrabe blog post, your taste buds may nevermore be the same.

And if you're a vegetarian, avert your gaze! Or peak through hand-covered eyes to read my queasy prose. I'm sure to be on Morrissey's #hit list if he ever sees this - he's pop music's most morose vegan. (And I'm a big fan of his songs with The Smiths.)

Some of my most spooky recipes may make your skin crawl, while others will have your taste buds baying at the moon with pleasure, mouthful after mouthful.

Witches Brew - a bubbling cauldron of Pozole.

So read on, and don't forget to click on any recipe name that will bring you kicking and screaming to my original blog post to see all the hair-raising details -- presented with gory gifs, bloodcurdling photos, grisly videos, and eerie text.

Right off the bat, I like my Chupacabra Carne Asada steak and hamburgers medium rare. Oozing is fine by me - E. coli be damned!

Grilling meat supercharges the flavor and brings out the knuckle-dragging Neanderthal in this Paleo Chef.

The Terminator T-bone

Raw bloody carcasses of meat have been disturbingly depicted in fine art. Rembrandt van Rijn is primarily known as a Dutch painter of moody portraits during the 17th Century, and I am especially influenced by his "Carcass of Beef" (flayed ox) study - just check out the audacious composition with gory details.

And here's the British artist Francis Bacon's 20th Century version, below.

The Chiaroscuro Chef photographs flesh against dark backgrounds lately (shot on a blackened cookie sheet) - usually lit from a single direction, with deep shadows, very much inspired by Caravaggio. An artfully dark and forbidding example is my recipe for Pasta alla Genovese, where I slice and dice cheap beef shank, slaughterous enough to make a zombie weep.

Offal is not so awful to this Carrion Chef. After watching a classic horror flick on the big screen, I cruise LA's fog-shrouded boulevards and alleyways during the midnight hour looking for ways to quell my ravenous appetites...for tacos, that is! 

Buche (stomach,) lengua (tongue,) and tripas (intestines) are on the menu at sidewalk taquerias and taco trucks throughout Los Angeles. Watch the shuddersome viscera-splattered video below to see what stops me in my tracks.



Get your hands dirty knawing on my Rosemary's Baby Back Ribs. You'll need extra napkins to soak up the BBQ sauce smeared on your libs and dripping from your fingertips.



My Silence of the Lambs Curry is creepy-delicious. And my video cooking directions are as easy to follow as leading a lamb to the slaughter.



It can get messy cooking with meat. You have to have an iron stomach. Try breaking down a pork shoulder sometime, like I do below for my ghastly Texas Chainsaw Carnitas video recipe.

It's probably the most artistically nauseating footage I've ever shot - but, boy does it taste heavenly when you cradle a stuffed tortilla, plump with citrus and cola marinated, slow-cooked pork.



Ground chicken is mushy and wet, more so, than ground beef or pork.

Check out my ground poultry The Blob Patty Melt video to see what I mean -- yuk!



After chicken, pork is the cheapest flesh. When hacked, mangled, and minced into sausage, it's delicious for breakfast, or added to a stir fry like my Garroted Green Beans and Gruesome Ground Pork recipe below.

This may sound perverse but it's actually fun to animate with ground meat, it's like playing with Play-Doh, just greasier. Check out my video below to see the messiness.



Are you still with me? Man, are you are hardcore! I'm getting extra creeped-out just assembling this blog post.

Ever gut a fish? Whoa, that is one freaky task! Slice the belly open, yank out the internal organs then chop off the head -- oh, I'm feeling faint just remembering the slimy viscera and the nauseating smell - barf!

If you want to scare the bejesus out of your dining guest, then serve them a Jaws Whole Grilled Fish - head on!

This tin-framed, bloody looking slaughter scene comprised of tomato-sauced fat fingers of sardines is one of my most visited food blog posts. And the morbid visitors are mostly from Europe (Translyvania?) - go figure. My pasta dish, Suspiria Sardines in Tomato Sauce with Olive Oil over Pasta, is a delicious mouthful worth sinking your incisors into.

Sushi is typically made with freshly butchered raw fish. It's so artfully presented that you miss the gore that goes into each delicate slice of aquatic flesh.

Here's one of my tastefully shot Sushi recipe videos, the simply presented, Mothra Tuna Sushi.



Shrimp would not seem spooky, right? But, buy head-on jumbo shrimp and try beheading, peeling and removing the spine/backbone sometime...ugh! But, man are they delicious when my Mom serves them up in her Stephen King Shrimp & Rice recipe.

Halloween has a dark streak of humor and some of my recipes do, too. Take my wacky Trump Orange Chicken Nightmare on K Street....please. It's the color and shape of a pumpkin, just like our Twit-in-Chief, and looks like a McDonald's Chicken McNugget, but my entree is made with real chicken pieces, not a pink slime composite.

How about a recipe where a slice of Bride of Frankenstein Turkey Bacon swallows up a Brussels sprout like a disembodied human tongue...yikes!

I like to cook whole chicken or leg quarters. There's nothing like the carnal pleasure of ripping apart a cooked poultry carcass and sucking every piece of succulent meat off the bones. My Tingler Chicken Tinga and Paranormal Poached Chicken are some saporous examples.

My brother from another daddy, the Swamp Chef, visited a butcher shop in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and was feted about behind the scenes. They use the whole hog at Iverstine Farms Butcher.

 Below is the Eviscerating Cuisinier's squishy butchering of a chicken breast and leg quarter. It's the cheapest flesh you can get and I have all kinds of poultry recipes, here.

So get out there and have an entertaining Halloween holiday. It's not all blood and guts! So, I'll leave you with an appallingly tasty ghost story.