Spread the love

Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers are a tasty, easy and delicious meal idea. You can serve it as it is or with meat, poultry or fish. A perfect weeknight dinner.

I have been digging around to find easy recipes to share such as this Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers.

To be honest, this exact recipe was originally called Vegetarian Paella, but I changed it. I just had to.

Needless to say, I was heavily inspired by Spanish popular dish Paella which is loaded with meat or seafood. Well, there are near hundreds of Paella recipes.

Everyone has their own household traditional way to make it. Paella is a typical Spanish recipe and is traditionally cooked in a “paellera“.

Tap Here For More Meatless Meals

A round flat pan with two handles, which is then put on the table for the family to enjoy the meal.

However, I do not own paellera, I cooked it in a regular pan then stuffed paella in the bell peppers as you can see from the pictures.

Paella is very versatile, of course, but so are the stuffed peppers. You can stuff them with anything you desire; potatoes, ground meat, rice, etc.

I choose to make this Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers inspired by Spanish Paella completely meatless. It has plenty of protein, also it’s very simple as well as perfect for this winter season.

So you can substitute and play with different ingredients depending on what you are having in your fridge and pantry.

Be open and experiment for a bit here. I would say that this is a very comforting dish, but also healthy and delicious.

You should definitely give it to try even if you are not vegetarian. You can add a side of any meat if you desire and treat this as a side dish. As you can see there are so many options.

With that being said, you could most defiantly make it ahead and bake at night.

Perhaps place in the slow cooker and do a low and slow version which is amazing. Peppers will probably be much tender but hey, it tastes amazing.

If you make this Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers please tag me on Instagram. @sandraseasycooking with hashtag #sandraseasycooking. Thank you so much in advance!

Serves 4

Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers

Name: Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 1 h
Total time: 1 h 30 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: SPANISH FUSION, INTERNATIONAL
Ingredients: 4 bell peppers; 1 can tomato sauce (15 ounces); 1 tablespoon olive oil; 2 pack Spanish rice, pre-cooked is fine (read notes), 12 to 14 ounces of rice; 2 Tbs. Olive Oil; 1/2 can black beans; 4 mushrooms, such as a white button or baby Bella, chopped; ½-1 teaspoon red chilli powder/or flakes; 1 tablespoon dried parsley; 1/2 tablespoon onion powder; 1 teaspoon garlic powder; 1/2 can of fire-roasted tomatoes or any other tomatoes; Salt and pepper if needed to taste

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 1 hour

Additional Time for rice: 20 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Vegetarian Rice and Beans Stuffed Peppers; tasty, and easy and perfect for your meatless Mondays.

Ingredients

4 bell peppers
1 can tomato sauce (15 ounces)
1 tablespoon olive oil

STUFFING

2 pack Spanish rice, pre-cooked is fine (read notes), 12 to 14 ounces of rice
2 Tbs. Olive Oil
1/2 can black beans
4 mushrooms, such as a white button or baby Bella, chopped
½-1 teaspoon red chilli powder/or flakes
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1/2 tablespoon onion powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 can of fire-roasted tomatoes or any other tomatoes
Salt and pepper if needed to taste

Instructions

If you are using pre-cooked Spanish rice then just toss 2 packs/bags in the bowl and start mixing with all the other stuffing ingredients. If you are cooking rice follow the instruction on the back of the rice pack. You may use yellow rice but it is quite different than Spanish.
Wash and cut the top of the Peppers off, take the seeds out. What I do instead of cutting is pishing the top then twisting. Pull it out. See pics below.
Preheat the oven on 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Boil a large pot of water with 1 tablespoon of salt and put the hollow peppers in. Cook for just a 3 minutes covered; Drain and let them cool for a minute or until you could handle them without burning yourself.
Prep all the ingredients for the stuffing then mix them together. Fill each pepper to the top with stuffing.
Add a pinch of salt and pepper to the tomato sauce, or to taste the drizzle a bit of to the bottom of the baking pan or a pot. Usually, I use tomato sauce in Tetra Pak, then add in a cup, add seasoning, mix and pour-over. That is my little trick since I try to avoid using cans as much as possible.
Add Stuffed peppers in the baking pan or a pot and pour all over the rest of the tomato sauce.
Line the peppers down as seen on the picture. If there is any stuffing leftover arrange it around the peppers in the baking dish.
Cover the whole dish, if possible, with a fitted lid, of not use aluminium foil to make a small dome. Bake for 45 minutes under the lid or aluminium foil. Take off lid/aluminium foil off and continue cooking for the next 10 to 15 minutes. Note* After the first 25 minutes of cooking/baking flip peppers on the other side. Be careful as the baking dish or a pot will be hot. Always use oven-safe pot.
Peppers should be very tender and perfectly blended once you are eating together with the stuffing.

Notes

One of the rice brands that I really love is RightRice. You can find it in any grocery store as well as on Amazon HERE

If you are vegetarian I would make my own Spanish rice because most likely they used chicken broth in the precooked version. Although the one from RightRice is Vegan so you're good with that brand.

Serve it with the Salad and bread on the side. You can also add any meat or fish on the side of this dish if you desire because it would go perfectly together.