Stan-The-Man's Famous Stuffed Peppers

I feel like this should have been a celebrity/guest post... Everyone raves about my dad's stuffed peppers! I learned to make this dish from him - it's one of my favorites to make during winter months! I'd have him type this post up to share, but while he's getting better every day with using his iPad and laptop, it'd probably take him weeks to finish typing the recipe and instructions out it it's entirety. Dad - I'll save you the work! :) I've been asked to email this recipe numerous times (and have!) but while making them this weekend for us and my in-laws, I figured that it'd be the perfect cold-weather recipe to share with everyone. Warning: it does take quite a while to prep this dish, but once it's done - they are to die for!

Prep Time: Approximately 1 hour

Cook Time: 40 minutes

Note: Because this recipe takes so long to prep, I like to make huge batches at once (at least a 12 pepper batch). Plus, when I make them - they don't last more than a day or two, so I like to make more so that they last! The following recipe is for 6 stuffed peppers (I figured that not everyone would want to end up with 12 peppers their first time making them)!

Ingredients:

- 6 bell peppers

- 1.5 lbs of ground beef

- 1.5 cups of rice

- 1.5 jars of spaghetti sauce

- 1 onion, chopped

- 1 cup of shredded cheese 

- desired spices

Directions:

1. Brown your hamburger meat in a skillet and drain any/all fat. Once you've drained the fat from the ground beef, you can add in your desired spices. Choose your spices depending on how spicy you'd like for them to be. I love spicy food, so I used a combination of Slap Ya Mama seasoning, Cajun, Old Bay, Oregano, Crushed Red Pepper and Garlic Powder (to balance out all of the other spices). 

2. Follow the instructions to cook your rice. 

For stuffed peppers, I like to use Minute Rice - easy and fast!

3. Next, you'll be ready to start cleaning and trimming your bell peppers! Wash the outside of the pepper, and then continue on to cut the tops of the pepper off (as shown below). You want to make sure that you trim the excess and everything out of the middle of the pepper. Also make sure that you're not taking too much off the top so that your peppers become so small. (The smaller the pepper, the less "stuffing" you get to put in the middle!)

4. In an XL mixing bowl, combine your ground beef, rice and one jar of spaghetti sauce. Stir and top with a few pinches of shredded cheese. For this dish, I like to use mozzarella cheese.

5. Now that your "insides" are finished - we're ready to boil the peppers! In a large pot, bring the water to a rapid boil. Add in as many peppers as can fit comfortably within the pot (making sure that all peppers you add are completely submerged). Let boil for 4 minutes.

6. After 4 minutes, remove the peppers from the boiling water and place in a bowl of cold water. (If doing multiple sets of peppers, be sure to replace the water after each rotation so that the water remains cold). Let sit in the cold water for about 2 minutes.

7. After 2 minutes, pull the peppers out to dry on a paper towel.

8. In a Pyrex dish (or if you have a stuffed pepper pan - thank you Susana for finding this dish for me!), spray your dish with non-stick spray and stand your peppers up in the dish. (If using a Pyrex dish, be sure that you use a small enough dish to make sure your peppers don't tip over while baking).

9. Once your peppers are standing up in your baking dish, you can start to fill the peppers with your "insides". Fill them almost to the top, leaving a little room for additional toppings.

10. Add 2 spoonfuls of spaghetti sauce to the top of each pepper.

11. Sprinkle each pepper with shredded cheese.

12. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes. After 30 minutes of baking, pull the peppers out to add another spoonful of spaghetti sauce and more shredded cheese. Pop them back in the oven for the remaining 10 minutes to finish!

13. Then you're ready to enjoy!! We actually jumped in to enjoy so fast, that by the time I remembered I needed to take a picture, there was one left! Here's our lone green stuffed pepper - they were delicious!