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
- Deep Stainless Steel Skillet
Nutrition
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 make something similar but I use Orzo and Chicken Sausage. Our toddler only eats the filling and not the pepper anyway!
“you’ll end up with a stuffed bell pepper soup.”
My late grandmother hated the effort of steaming cabbage to make cabbage rolls, so she turned it into soup – meatballs, shredded cabbage, and a sweet-and-sour tomato broth.
This is one of the first recipes I tried making on my own (and one that turned out, anyway), and it’s one that I keep going back to as a sort of staple dish. I know it’s SUPPOSED to be just like stuffed peppers but I’ve thrown in other additions like corn, mushrooms, etc. with pretty good success. (Mind you, I don’t usually make the tomato sauce topping–cheese is my preference!) Any meal that can be cooked in one pot is good enough for me! I just want to thank you for not only the simple recipes, but also, and most importantly, the PICTURES. For someone who didn’t really know how to cook and wasn’t encouraged to work in the kitchen, actually seeing what to do is a thousand times more helpful than just reading instructions.
Also, for what it’s worth, I’ve made this with brown rice before; I just follow the ratio of water-rice lisred on the package and simmer for the length of time it asks for–usually it’s longer than what white rice would be but it turns out. The last time I tried with brown it actually sort of…gelled? Like the brown rice formed a sort of gravy in the mixture, this may have been because I didn’t rinse the rice beforehand though (having grown up with Minute Rice or prepackaged rice that didn’t call for rinsing, I didn’t realize.) It was pretty good, actually. But yes, for cooking times I think swaps are absolutely possible so long as you follow the correct water-grain ratio and simmer accordingly, it’s just that you might have to wait a bit longer to dig in.
Delicious and was good as stuffed peppers!
Any tips on making this in an slow cooker or pressure cooker?
Hmm, I don’t know off hand. I think it would definitely need some testing to see how it holds up and what the best methods would be.
I have been making this for a few years now and Love it! I add pork sausage and beef together and it tastes just like stuffed peppers without the work or stuffing and without the mushy pepper texture!
Can this be made with brown rice? What would need to be adjusted?
You’d have to change quite a bit, unfortunately, and it would take some testing to figure out the best liquid ratios and cooking times.
My toddler has been super picky lately not eating dinner. This is the first dinner she ate completely in I don’t know how long. This was really good! I didn’t have tomato sauce available so I used some tomato paste and water, also vegetable broth since I had no beef broth. Great recipe, keeping for the book!
I have to say, this is one of my very favorite recipes. Your directions are so clear that it always tastes yummy when I make this. I do have one small problem though, I recently went low carb, so rice is now a no-no. I tried this last night with riced cauliflower (and skipped the beef broth step). Texturally it came out just right–cooked it a little shorter time. But the flavor was not quite there–I’m sure it’s because I skipped boiling it for a while in the broth. Do you think putting in a beef bullion cube next time might do the trick or would that overpower the flavor?
Yes, I think that’s a good idea. That will make up for the flavor you lost by leaving out the broth. :)
Brown rice worked fine. My wife and son do not like peppers, but love stuffed peppers with stuffing removed. I doubled the recipe. I substituted 1 pack of 8 oz. Mushrooms and 2 zucchini for peppers and added salt at the end. This was incredible.
I loved this recipe! Super easy and delicious!
I cooked my rice in rice cooker with the broth and then added all in same
Pot !! Voila perfect rice !
My rice keeps burning :( any suggestions?
It’s likely the cookware that you’re using. If the metal is thin you will get hot spots and uneven cooking, which can cause the rice to burn.
unfortunately this was one recipe I was just not a fan of. Don’t get me wrong it was DE-Licious. however I just had way too much rice to be enjoyable. Also I suck at rice so it was kind of mushy. I seriously love all these recipes though.
Ahh! It tasted good but I had to add more liquid and keep it simmering for 1 hr to get the rice remotely tender. Next time I will cook the rice separate and add it in after!
Can I freeze leftovers?
Yes, these should freeze pretty well. :)
Have you tried this in a crockpot by any chance?