Try these Unstuffed Peppers for an easy, healthy dinner! Our kids actually EAT the peppers when we cut them up and mix them in with the seasoned beef!
Who doesn’t love easy, 15 minute dinners like this? Be sure and try our equally easy Beefy Tomato Soup or this 8 minute air fryer or 15 minute oven dinner, Chinese Boneless Spareribs!
A Dinner Recipe Your Kids Will Love!
Do you love making stuffed peppers? I mean, yes, I do. But my kids will hungrily eat the filling out and leave that big pepper behind. Recently we’ve made more stuffed pepper recipes that I absolutely LOVE. And I have to say our kids actually do eat the pepper now, we’ve got ’em trained;)
I can’t say too much, I did that too for most of my life. We weren’t a big vegetable family growing up so the bowl of frozen peas and carrots was only on the table for special occasions or holidays.
Now we try and have fresh vegetables on the table every night, or at least a dinner that involves vegetables like stuffed peppers. So to prevent our kids from just eating the filling we created this Unstuffed Pepper recipe instead.
All you need to do is dice the peppers and cook them with the beef and onions when you make the “filling”, but the filling is the dinner.
Once you add the tomato sauce and let the beef simmer together with the vegetables…you won’t be able to stop eating it right from the pan.
We like to serve this recipe over rice or pasta like elbow macaroni (really any pasta will do, it’s almost like a meat sauce with peppers) but you can also serve it over cauliflower rice for a low carb dinner!
Piling this beef filling on buns like a peppery sloppy joe also works. A topping for nachos, add beans and make a quick chili…there’s so many things you can do with this Unstuffed Peppers recipe besides just eating it as is!
Do I Have To Make This Recipe With Beef?
Nope, you can use ground turkey or pork or even ground chicken or lamb. The peppers kind of have to stay or this wouldn’t be a twist on a stuffed pepper recipe but you can definitely swap out the type of meat.
On that note, you can absolutely sneak more vegetables into this recipe, too! We have teenage boys in our house now so we’re WAY past trying to get our kids to eat.
WAY past that. Now we just try and keep our refrigerators full of food. Going to the grocery store every 2 or 3 days is not unheard if. ALL THEY DO IS EAT.
But I do feel like we gave them a good food foundation, not making too many separate meals when they were young (I won’t say never, just not often) and introducing them to all sorts of different foods as much as we could. Dinner recipes like this one definitely helped when they were younger, they ate this up like rock stars, and still do!
Need More Easy Dinner Ideas?
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Unstuffed Peppers
5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star 4.4 from 16 reviews
Author:Dan
Prep Time:5 minutes
Cook Time:15 minutes
Total Time:20 minutes
Yield:41x
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This super easy dinner recipe will help get the vegetables in your kids mouths instead of leaving them behind!
Scale
Ingredients
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef
3 cups diced bell peppers (mixed colors)
1 cup diced onion
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons cumin
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 cups of tomato sauce
Instructions
Add the olive oil to a skillet over medium heat. Brown the ground beef until cooked through and drain any excess grease form the pan.
Add the peppers, onions and garlic to the beef. Stir and cook for 5-7 minutes until the vegetables are softened.
Add in the cumin, salt and pepper, soy sauce, worcestershire sauce and the tomato sauce. Stir well to combine and then taste for seasonings.
Cook the whole green peppers, uncovered in boiling water for about 5 minutes; invert to drain well. Sprinkle insides of the peppers lightly with salt. In a skillet cook ground beef, onion and 1/4 cup chopped pepper till meat is browned and vegetables are tender. Drain off excess fat.
You can also pre-cook them in the oven before they're filled. Preheat your oven to the temperature recommended by the recipe, place them in the oven until they are tender, then fill and return the stuffed peppers to the oven for the remainder of the cooking time.
No Moisture In, No Moisture Out. Following the logic of precooking your peppers to safeguard against sogginess, you should also avoid watery ingredients in your stuffing. Let's say your filling calls for tomato sauce. Rather than spooning it directly into your hollowed peppers, reduce it on the stove until it's thick.
You can start by sautéing the peppers and onions in oil or butter until the peppers are soft and the onion is translucent, then add the ground beef and continue to cook together.
Cooking raw chicken and vegetables in the same pan is generally safe as long as proper food safety practices are followed. Here are some important points to consider: Cooking Temperatures: Both chicken and vegetables need to reach a safe internal temperature to kill any harmful bacteria.
Preferably brown the beef, remove then cook onions. However if you don't want to remove food from the pan, reverse and start the onions the add beef. Onions can withstand more cooking and benefit from longer cooking.
We recommend seasoning your meat a bit before cooking to allow it to settle and absorb for a tastier outcome. You can also add some seasoning towards the end of the cooking to subtly enhance the taste. Take note that this is only to enhance the flavor and not the initial seasoning.
Fill with water until vegetables are fully covered and bring to a gentle boil. Cook for about 3 minutes, spoon out and pat dry to remove excess water. If you are in a rush, you can try microwaving the peppers for about 5 minutes on a microwave-safe plate.
In addition to not getting enough water, some other possible causes of bitter peppers are: Ripening: Peppers grow sweeter as they ripen and turn from green to red, orange, yellow, or purple. For the sweetest peppers, be sure they're fully ripe before picking.
I definitely suggest par-cooking the bell peppers first, just a little bit before stuffing them. Not only does this help to soften the bell peppers, but it also cuts down on your cook time. As the bell peppers are cooking you can make the filling, shaving off about 20 minutes from your total cook time.
While you can cook raw chicken and peppers in the same pan, it's important that you continue cooking the peppers, which don't take as long to cook, until the chicken is fully cooked, to an internal temperature of 165F.
Raw meat can carry germs like viruses and bacteria that can make you sick.These can transfer to our hands, cooking utensils, and other food. This is called "cross-contamination".
Yes. One can bake vegetable with raw chicken. It's depend on which vegetable your cooking with chicken. Some vegetable needs longer time and some get baked quickly.
Introduction: My name is Frankie Dare, I am a funny, beautiful, proud, fair, pleasant, cheerful, enthusiastic person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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