STUFFED PEPPERS WITH VEGGIES COUSCOUS

I love stuffed peppers.  I have a really good recipe for Mexican Stuffed Peppers.  However, growing up I could not stand them.  Mainly because I did not like bell peppers.  Maybe that is because we only used green ones and they can be bitter.  As an adult, I have come to really enjoy eating them.  

I decided I wanted to make a healthy version of stuffed peppers.  I looked and researched then as usual came up with my own recipe.  

These are loaded with veggies.  You can really use any that you want to but I used onion, mushrooms, zucchini, and tomatoes.  I sauteed everything but the tomatoes.  For my binder I used couscous.  I added everything together and cut up some sweet cherry tomatoes and tossed those into the mix.  I opted out of using cheese but feel free to add some cheese at the end as a topping.  

I normally add tomato sauce or salsa in with the mix and also on top.  I chose not to do so but I really think a tomato sauce cooked with some herbs would be a wonderful addition to this recipe.  

I cut my peppers in half lengthwise.  Placed them face down on a parchment-lined dish and cooked them at 475 for 15 minutes to blister the skin just a tiny bit.  This really added more flavor to the peppers.  It was almost like a roasted pepper.  Very yummy.  Once they came out of the oven I turned them over and piled them full of the veggie couscous mixture.  Plopped them back into the oven for 10 minutes.  Now if you wanted to add sauce to the top add this before they go back into the oven.  Once they come out if you want to add cheese add it as soon as they come out of the oven.  The cheese will melt without going back into the oven. They really came out much better than I thought they would.  

STUFFED PEPPERS WITH VEGGIES AND COUSCOUS

Ingredients

• 4 multiple colored bell peppers
• 1 large zucchini chopped
• 1 onion chopped
• 8 baby Bella mushrooms chopped
• 2 teaspoons garlic chopped
• 10 sweet cherry tomatoes
• 1 box of couscous

Directions

• Preheat oven to 475 degrees
• Cut bell peppers lengthwise, take out seeds, add them face down into a parchment-lined casserole dish.  Drizzle oil on top of peppers.
• Put casserole dish into the oven for 15 minutes.  Take out and turn peppers over.
• While the peppers are cooking chop a zucchini, an onion, and the mushrooms.  Saute them in a pan with some olive oil. Chop the tomatoes and make the couscous according to the directions. Once all is cooked add everything and mix well. 
• Fill the peppers with the filling mixture and cook for another 10 minutes.

Variations

• As stated above if you want to add some herbed tomato sauce do so before cooking for 10 minutes.  
• You can also add cheese as soon as you take the peppers out of the oven.  
• Substitute quinoa for the couscous.