Stuffed bell peppers are awesome, but I always find them slightly awkward or difficult to eat. Can’t I just throw the ingredients in a bowl and eat it with a fork?! (I feel that way about a lot of food, TBH). So that’s what I ended up doing! These super simple unstuffed bell peppers are cooked in one skillet to make your (my) life super easy and delicious. #yesplease
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Can I Use Cauliflower Rice Instead of White Rice?
Unfortunately, you can not swap out cauliflower rice for the white rice in this recipe. Cauliflower rice releases liquid as it cooks, whereas white rice absorbs it, so you’ll end up with a stuffed bell pepper soup. :) But hey, that actually doesn’t sound so bad! You can also try using cauli rice and skipping the broth, but you’ll be missing a lot of flavor with that option.
Can I Freeze Unstuffed Bell Peppers?
Yes, this recipe freezes great! Make sure to divide the skillet into single serving portions just after cooking, and chill them completely in the refrigerator before transferring to the freezer. Once frozen, they’ll keep in the freezer for about three months and can be reheated in the microwave straight from the freezer (use the defrost setting first, then high until heated through).
Tips for Making One-Pot Rice Dishes
Even cooking plain rice on the stovetop can be a bit challenging for some folks, and when you add in other ingredients it can end up a little more tricky. To make sure your rice cooks thoroughly and evenly, keep these things in mind:
- Cookware: A really good quality (thick and heavy) skillet is really important for making this recipe work correctly. Heavy cookware conducts heat really evenly so the sides of your skillet will cook at the same rate as the part that is right above the flame. If it’s a thin skillet, it might scorch right in the center and leave the outer edges uncooked. If you don’t have a good skillet, a dutch oven or heavy soup pot would also work well.
- Heat level: Another key to cooking rice is making sure the water in the pot (or skillet) is simmering the whole time, but the heat is not so high that it burns on the bottom. So once you’ve got everything in the pot and have already brought everything up to a boil, turn the heat down to the lowest setting that still maintains a light simmer. Since this can vary from stove to stove and the type of cookware you’re using, you’ll need to adjust this based on what you’re hearing and seeing in the pot. Once you get the hang of it, though, it will be easy!
- Use a burner close in size to the bottom of your pot or skillet. If you’re using a wide bottomed pot or skillet over a very small burner, the outside edges of your pot or skillet may not receive enough heat to simmer and cook the rice through.
Love skillet meals? Check out my Chorizo Sweet Potato Skillet, Creamy Chicken and Rice Skillet, or One Pot Teriyaki Chicken and Rice.
Unstuffed Bell Peppers
Servings 6 1 ⅓ cups eachIngredients
- 1 clove garlic ($0.08)
- 1 yellow onion ($0.32)
- 2 bell peppers ($1.53)
- 1 Tbsp olive oil ($0.16)
- 1/2 lb. ground beef ($2.85)
- 1 15oz. can diced tomatoes ($1.00)
- 1 cup long grain white rice (uncooked) ($0.62)
- 1 tsp dried basil ($0.10)
- 1 tsp dried oregano ($0.10)
- 1/4 tsp freshly cracked black pepper ($0.02)
- 1.5 cups beef broth ($0.07)
- 1 8oz. can tomato sauce ($0.26)
- 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce ($0.01)
- 1 cup shredded mozzarella ($0.85)
- 1 Tbsp chopped parsley (optional garnish) ($0.05)
Instructions
- Mince the garlic and dice the onion and bell pepper.
- Add the olive oil and ground beef to a deep skillet. Cook the beef over medium heat until it is fully browned.
- Add the diced onion, bell pepper, minced garlic, basil, oregano, and pepper to the skillet. Continue to cook and stir until the onions are soft.
- Next, add the diced tomatoes (with juices), uncooked rice, and beef broth. Give everything a brief stir to combine.
- Place a lid on the skillet and turn the heat up to medium-high. Allow the broth to come up to a full boil. Once boiling, turn the heat down to low and let it continue to simmer for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, turn the heat off and let it rest, lid still in place, for another five minutes.
- While the pot is simmering, combine the tomato sauce and Worcestershire sauce.
- Once the rice has rested for 5 minutes, remove the lid and fluff it with a fork, gently folding the ingredients back together (peppers and tomatoes may float to the top while it simmers).
- Pour the prepared tomato sauce over top, then sprinkled the shredded mozzarella over the sauce. Place the lid back on top and let the heat from the skillet melt the mozzarella. Once melted, sprinkle a little chopped parsley on top and serve.
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Equipment
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Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!Scroll down for the step by step photos!
How to Make Unstuffed Bell Peppers – Step by Step Photos
Mince one clove of garlic and dice a yellow onion and bell pepper. Add ½ lb. ground beef to a deep skillet with 1 Tbsp olive oil. Cook the ground beef over medium heat until it has fully browned. Add the diced bell pepper, onion, garlic, 1 tsp dried basil, 1 tsp dried oregano, and about ¼ tsp freshly ground pepper to the skillet. Continue to cook and stir until the onions are soft.
Next, add one 15oz. can of diced tomatoes (with juices), 1 cup uncooked long grain white rice, and 1.5 cups beef broth to the skillet.
Give everything a brief stir to combine. Place a lid on the skillet, turn the heat up to medium-high and allow the broth to come up to a full boil. Once boiling, turn the heat down to low and let it continue to simmer for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, turn the heat off and let it rest, lid still in place, for an additional 5 minutes.
While the rice is simmering, prepare the tomato sauce. Combine one 8oz. can of tomato sauce with 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce. Set the sauce aside.
After the rice has rested for five minutes, remove the lid and fluff it with a fork, gently folding the tomatoes and peppers back into the rice.
Pour the prepared tomato sauce over the rice in the skillet, then top with 1 cup shredded mozzarella. Place the lid back on the skillet and let the residual heat melt the cheese.
Top with chopped parsley, if desired, and serve!
I just discovered your blog and I am IN LOVE! I’m a “foodie” and I’m so excited to be able to make your yummy recipes and not spend tons of cash on expensive ingredients I’ll only use once. Thank you thank you!!
My husband and I just made this last night and it was awesome! It was easy to make, easy to eat, easy to buy, and easy to pack for lunch the next day. Thank you so much!
This recipe was amazingly delicious and came out perfectly. Great recipe. I am making it for the second time tonight!
I used brown rice with the recipe. I ended up using 2 cups of beef stock for the initial 30 minutes. I then added another two cups of beef stock and let it simmer for another 30 minutes. This recipe turned out so delicious. I didn’t feel like cooking the rice separately so I was committed to figuring out how to do it in the same skillet. Your recipes are always so delicious. Thank you!!!
This was delicious, tastes exactly like a stuffed bell pepper in half the time and effort. This is something my family has always called Spanish rice, never thought of it as an unstuffed bell pepper (but it completely is)! Will totally make again! Love your blog, thanks for all the great recipes!
Beth, my favorite part about your recipes is how flexible they are–both in method and ingredients. I think I switched out every ingredient in this dish, based on what I had in the pantry or my personal preferences, and it still tasted great. Thank you!
I used 10 minute brown rice with only 1 cup water and reduced the cooking time, turned out great,thanks
Just finished the last of this recipe. It gets better with time. Beth, I was thinking about using the same concept, except to make unstuffed cabbage rolls. Any suggestions?
Ooh, yes, you could do that with shredded cabbage!
I made unstuffed cabbage rolls with this method. Instead of using green peppers, I used 1/2 head of 1 inch chopped cabbage. Didn’t use the oregano or basil. I mixed the tomato sauce into the skillet along with 1 T each brown sugar and lemon juice. I love this method!
This was such a good recipe! My whole family gobbled it up. Thanks for another great recipe!
One thing you can do if you don’t want to use white rice because you’re a whole grain fan is to substitute a quicker-cooking whole grain like quinoa or millet. Alternatively, one way to use brown rice is to transfer the meat-veg mixture to a rice cooker, add rice and liquidy ingredients, then enough extra liquid to match the liquid needed for brown rice in your cooker. Bonus: rice cooker will now keep meal warm for hours.
this recipe is right up my alley! I usually eat the stuffing of everything, so I will be making this soon!
This turned out awesome, tastes just like my grandma’s stuffed peppers, but this was WAY easier to make! Grandma always put sauerkraut on top, so I did that with this recipe, and it tasted great.
Been making this for years. It’s always a favorite at our house. A good way to stuff bell peppers is to cut them long ways. Clean out the seeds but leave the stem intact. Lay them on their sides and stuff and cook as usual. Much easier to eat. Great for small eaters too.
Made this myself, sometimes I’ll mix it all together and bake it in the oven. The other dish that I make this way is stuffed cabbage rolls.p, just chop the cabbage and mix with most of these same ingredients. Much easier to make on a work night!
This was one of those times when I looked at one of your recipes and said “Hey! I have everything I need to make that right now!” So I did.
I used ground turkey, brown rice, and skipped the topping because I was out of tomato sauce and cheese, both. I think I would have preferred the cheese, though. I tried precooking the rice a little, but I really needed to do more- it was still a little chewy after 40 minutes.
It was also the first time I used fresh basil and oregano from my little kitchen garden! This was good and flavorful, but I think I would have liked it more with some cheese on top… :)