Greek Stuffed Peppers

I bought two of the biggest green bell peppers today I have ever seen in my entire life!  The larger was 4½” in diameter!  Moreover, they had the thickest walls  (nearly ½” thick) and were surely the sweetest peppers I’ve ever tasted.  Usually a recipe of filling using 1 lb. of ground beef will make four stuffed peppers.  These two colossal specimens took ALL the filling and they weren’t even particularly overstuffed!

I didn’t have any kind of recipe  for this.  I just decided to take some ground meat, cheese it up with several cheeses (including feta of course), add some typical Greek seasonings and see what resulted.   Glad I did, as these came out GREAT!!  Then, after dinner, I Googled “Greek Stuffed Peppers” and indeed, they do make something similar in Greece, but with rice added to the filling, which I can’t eat on a low-carb diet.  These are only Induction friendly if you omit the red wine.

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INGREDIENTS:

4   3-oz. bell peppers, any color (try to select peppers with fairly flat bottoms)

16 oz. ground beef (or ground lamb)

2 oz. onion, chopped fine

1 Roma tomato, chopped

1 T. tomato paste

1/3 c. water

¼ c. red wine (omit if on Induction)

1 large clove garlic, minced

1/8 tsp. cinnamon

¼ tsp. crushed dried oregano

¼ c. parsley, chopped

½ c. feta, rinsed in strainer under cold water

½ c. Monterrey Jack cheese

2 tsp. Parmesan

VARIATION:  Use some dill weed in place of the cinnamon

DIRECTIONS:   Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cut the tops off peppers and save for some other use.  Remove seed core.  Boil the main pepper bottoms 3-4 minutes to begin to tenderize them a bit, which will greatly shorten overall baking time on this dish.    Remove and drain and place in baking dish.  Preheat the oven to 350º at this point.  Next brown the ground meat in a non-stick skillet.  Add onion, garlic, tomato, tomato paste, wine and water.  Next add the parsley and spices.  Simmer about 10 minutes, stirring, until tomato and onion are fully tender and the liquid is evaporating nicely. Add feta and Jack cheese.  Stir to blend and melt.  Remove from heat.  Stuff the peppers and sprinkle the tops with the Parmesan cheese.  Pop in preheated 350º oven for 30-35 minutes or until pepper shells are tender,  but not overcooked and falling apart.  Serve with a nice Greek salad.

NUTRITIONAL INFO:   Makes 4 stuffed peppers, each contains:

370 calories

23.18 g  fat

8.15 g  carbs, 2.1 g  fiber, 6.05 g  NET CARBS

29 g  protein

720 mg sodium