Monday, August 8, 2011

Happy Italians!

 I made a stop at our mini-farmer's market downtown this past Friday.  I wasn't really looking for anything in particular, but I spotted these orange and yellow sweet banana peppers (3 for .75) and decided that I wanted to attempt to make stuffed peppers.  I have made stuffed bell peppers with ground beef and rice several times and didn't figure this would too much different, but in fact it ended up being a lot easier.

I'm not much of a sausage eater, but Michael loves it, so we compromised on 3 with sausage and 3 with a ricotta and zucchini mixture (the zucchini also from the farmer's market for .50)  I made a sauce with olive oil, tomato paste and sauce, garlic, onion, bell pepper seeds and fresh basil from my garden (and no cheese which is weird for Michael and I).

While that simmered I mixed the sausage with and egg and some  mozzarella, stuffed the peppers and made meatballs with what was left.  For the ricotta mixture I added zucchini, an egg and some spices.  Put the peppers in a olive oiled pan with the sauce and baked in the oven uncovered at 350 for about an hour.  We ate it with rosemary bread that Michael picked up at Sam's Club and an antipasto plate which was inspired by freshly ripened tomato and basil from my garden.  Yum!