Ground meat stuffed peppers: baked recipe
Stuffed peppers are prepared in three steps: empty the peppers, fill them with a mixture of browned ground meat, onion, rice, and herbs, then cook them for 40 to 45 minutes in the oven at 180 °C, covered with tomato sauce. Success depends on a filling moist enough to stay tender and ground meat that is ground just before cooking, with a medium grind.
Here is the basic recipe for 4 people, the choice of pepper and meat, then the variations to change from the classic dish without losing the tenderness.
The recipe for stuffed peppers in the oven
This recipe for 4 people takes place in two steps: the list of ingredients to gather, then the preparation and cooking steps in the oven, to follow in order.
The ingredients for 4 people
- 4 large, straight peppers, red or yellow
- 400 g of ground beef, or half beef, half veal
- 1 onion and 2 cloves of garlic
- 80 g of raw rice, half-cooked (10 minutes in water)
- 1 egg
- A small bunch of parsley
- 400 g of tomato coulis or pulp
- Olive oil, salt, pepper, 1 teaspoon of mild paprika
The steps
- Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Cut a lid on each pepper, remove the seeds and white membranes.
- Brown the chopped onion and garlic in a drizzle of oil for 5 minutes. Add the meat and let it just lose its red color.
- Off the heat, mix the meat with the drained rice, the egg, the chopped parsley, the paprika, the salt and the pepper.
- Fill the peppers without packing too tightly, replace the lids and place them in a casserole dish.
- Pour the tomato coulis around, with half a glass of water. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes basting twice with the sauce.
The peppers are ready when the skin wrinkles and the tip of a knife goes through them without resistance. The filling must be very hot in the center: it is ground meat, it is consumed cooked through, especially for children. For a filling base that you can adapt to other vegetables, follow our ground meat filling recipe.
Should you pre-cook the peppers before stuffing them?
Pre-cooking is not essential, but it saves oven time.
It is not mandatory: 40 to 45 minutes at 180 °C is enough to make them tender. To save 10 minutes, you can blanch them for 3 minutes in boiling water before filling them, then allow 30 to 35 minutes in the oven. They are ready when the skin wrinkles.
Which pepper and meat to choose for the filling
The pepper sets the tone of the dish. The meat, on the other hand, determines the tenderness of the filling.
| Element | Choice | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Red pepper | The sweetest and sweetest | Ideal for a spicy filling or for children |
| Yellow or orange pepper | Sweet, thin flesh | Cooks a little faster, beautiful color when served |
| Green pepper | More bitter, firm flesh | Holds up well during cooking, stronger taste |
| Ground beef at 15% fat | The classic compromise | Tender filling, little fat in the dish |
| Beef and veal mix | More tender | Fine texture, milder taste |
| Ground lamb | More aromatic | Perfect with cumin, mint and coriander |
Avoid meat that is too lean (5%): it dries out during the 45 minutes in the oven. If you grind it yourself, a piece of chuck or top round passed through a medium grid gives a filling that holds together without becoming compact. To compare the appliances capable of this work, see our meat grinder collection.
The mistakes that make stuffed peppers dry or bland
A dense filling, burnt skin, or meat that lacks juice often come from the same mistakes. Here they are one by one, with the simple way to correct each one.
- A filling that is too packed or without a binder: packed, it turns into a dense block. Without egg or rice, it releases its juice and shrinks at the bottom of the pepper. Fill to the brim without pressing, and keep the rice half-cooked: it finishes swelling in the juice of the meat and the tomato.
- An oven that is too hot and no sauce: at 220 °C, the skin burns before the pepper flesh is tender. Stay at 180 °C and always keep a base of sauce in the dish: it creates steam and prevents the bottom from sticking.
- Ground meat from the day before: homemade ground meat, prepared just before, loses less water than an open tray from the day before.
These rules also apply to traditional stuffed tomatoes, which release even more juice.
Stuffed pepper variations
Once the basic recipe is mastered, you can change the meat, the binder, or the finish. Here are four stuffed pepper variations to change from one meal to another.
- Oriental style: ground lamb, cumin, fresh coriander, raisins, and a little mint in the tomato sauce.
- Without rice: replace it with breadcrumbs soaked in a little milk, or with oat flakes.
- Gratinated: 10 minutes before the end, a spoonful of grated cheese on each pepper.
- With poultry: ground chicken or turkey, with fresh herbs and a little cream. Allow the same cooking time, cooked through.
To quickly grind the onion, garlic, and herbs for the filling, an appliance from our vegetable grinder collection saves most of the preparation time.
Can you freeze stuffed peppers?
Stuffed peppers can easily be prepared in advance for several meals.
Yes, once cooked and cooled, in an airtight container, for about 3 months. Defrost them in the refrigerator then reheat them for 20 minutes in the oven at 170 °C with a little sauce. As with any ground meat, the filling must be very hot in the center when serving.
Tender stuffed peppers, without surprises
Remember the balance that makes the dish: meat at 15% fat browned quickly, half-cooked rice for the binder, 40 to 45 minutes at 180 °C in a base of tomato sauce. To adapt the same method to other vegetables, also see our stuffed zucchini in the oven.
To grind your filling just before cooking and choose the grind, our collection of electric meat grinders brings together models with multiple grids.
All our meat and vegetable grinders are on Hachoir Cuisine.