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Chicken is such a healthy ingredient, but gets boring quickly. You can season it, chop it up, or stir fry it. But making a stuffed pepper is a creative way to incorporate a vegetable (peppers) into your meal. In addition, a chopped up chicken can soak up marinade flavors from juices and spices. Following this recipe is fairly straightforward. Because the marinade has a second opportunity to absorb flavors while being cooked with the pepper, you can accidentally over-cook the chicken on the stove top without ruining the entire recipe. I therefore consider this recipe easy.
What to know before beginning this recipe:
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This recipe may take longer if your stove top pan (like my cast iron pan) isn't large. Because this recipe requires the peppers and pre-cooked chicken be baked in the oven, it may be a limiting factor in preparing enough for the whole family.
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You may need to vary the time the pepper is spent cooking in the oven. My first batch, the peppers were not fully cooked (but I had already let the pepper cool down).
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Even though the meat is cooked with the pepper, it's difficult not to scoop the meat out, leaving an empty shell of a pepper. Then, eating the pepper separately is not so fun, as most of the flavor is cooked into the meat.
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Since I had extra meat filling when I made this recipe, the leftover meat filling goes well mixed with rice as a separate meal. If you have tortillas, you can make a small taco or burrito.
I would definitely do this recipe again, and switch it up. Pre-cooking steak or pork instead of chicken, or a combination of meats is one way to change the flavor. An obvious second way to switch up this recipe is change type of spices for a different flavor.
Ingredient
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1/3 cup vegetable oil
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1 tablespoon lime juice
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1 tsp cumin
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salt
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2 garlic cloves, minced
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2 chicken breasts
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3 bell peppers
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1/2 chopped onions
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1 medium tomato
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5 oz cooked rice
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1 tsp minced cilantro
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5 tsp Mexican Cheese Mix
Instructions
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Mix vegetable oil, lime juice, cumin, paprika, salt, a minced garlic together as a marinade.
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Let the chicken marinate in the marinade for at least 15 minute.
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Cook chicken on the oven-safe stove top, flipping it halfway through.
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Saute chopped onions and tomatoes in the same oven-safe pan.
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Chop the chicken into small pieces.
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Mix the chicken, rice, sauteed onions and tomatoes, and cilantro. Season with additional salt as necessary.
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Cut the bell pepper length-wise. Clean out the seeds and membrane.
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Stuff the bell pepper with the mixture from the clean bowl.
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Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Sprinkle the Mexican Cheese over each bell pepper.
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Put the stuff bell peppers back into the skillet and bake in the oven for 20 minutes.