11 September 2023

Stuffed Peppers

A beautiful main dish when you’re fancying a meat-free day or if you have a veggie friend coming round for dinner. Tasty with a bit of spice and you don’t miss any meat.

Photography: HAARALA HAMILTON

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Serves

Ingredients

3 tbsp of olive oil or a knob of butter

1 tsp of cumin seeds

1 onion, finely chopped

200g of basmati rice, rinsed until the water runs clear

½ –1 tsp of ground allspice, to taste

1-2 tsp of Aleppo pepper, to taste, plus extra to sprinkle

2 tomatoes, deseeded & finely chopped or 1 tbsp of tomato purée

30g of flat-leaf parsley, leaves & stems roughly chopped

4 romano peppers (if you can’t find romano peppers, use regular red peppers instead)

40g of walnuts, toasted & roughly chopped

Sea salt flakes & ground black pepper

Method

Step 1

Warm 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and the knob of butter in a medium saucepan. Add the cumin seeds and cook for 30 seconds, until fragrant. Add the onion and cook on a medium–low heat for about 10 minutes, until translucent and lightly golden.

Step 2

While the onion is cooking, tip the rice into a saucepan of salted water, bring to the boil and cook for 4 minutes, then drain and refresh in cold water.

Step 3

Once the onions are cooked, remove the pan from the heat. Add the par-boiled rice, along with the allspice, Aleppo pepper, chopped tomato or tomato purée and half the parsley, and season generously.

Step 4

Heat the air fryer to 180°C.

Step 5

Make a slit down the length of a pepper, starting at the top and stopping about 2cm/ ¾ inch from the bottom, so that you have a pouch. Carefully remove the seeds and pith and rub with a little of the remaining olive oil. Fill the pocket with one quarter of the rice mixture and gently push the edges together. Repeat with the remaining peppers and rice mixture.

Step 6

Get the peppers into the air-fryer basket, making sure there is space between each, and cook for 20–30 minutes, until beginning to char.

Step 7

Sprinkle the peppers with the toasted walnuts, the remaining parsley and a big sprinkling of Aleppo pepper. Serve individually or on a big serving platter.

POPPY'S SUGGESTIONS

This is my muhammara-inspired stuffed pepper. You could add crumbled feta, labneh or garlic and lemon yogurt dressing (just add 1 crushed garlic clove and lemon juice to yogurt to taste) to the stuffing, if you wanted.

You could use other soft herbs – coriander, chervil, chives and dill would all work well.

Recipe courtesy of Extract taken from Poppy Cooks: The Actually Delicious Air Fryer Cookbook by Poppy O’Toole (Bloomsbury, £20 Hardback) Photography © Haarala Hamilton

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