Healthy Stuffed Peppers With A Terrific Garden Vegetable Sauce

These healthy stuffed peppers are easy, gluten-free, and delicious, but they become extraordinary with my fantastic garden vegetable sauce!

You must try these awesome stuffed peppers with a simple but incredibly tasty, gluten-free vegetable sauce. A great harvest time recipe for using your fresh garden vegetables!

This is an heirloom family recipe that has been my favorite since I was a kid and it still hangs out at the top of my favorite list.

My mom always made a special sauce for her stuffed peppers, that really made this dish outstanding. Just a perfect combination of flavors to produce the ultimate comfort food. I didn’t ever write down her recipe, but I watched her make it often and I’ve made it many times myself now, and it tastes just like hers.

She’s not here anymore, but she left us with great memories that I can relive through recreating those awesome meals of hers. Now I’m sharing it with you all to keep it alive and thriving! I hope you give this a try and I’m certain that it will become a new favorite of yours as well. Hey, let’s head for the kitchen! 

If you love peppers, don’t miss my fermented pepper recipes, Fermented Jalapenos, Fermented Chili Paste, and Cantaloupe Hot Sauce. And another family recipe with Bessarabian origin is this amazing Zucchini Ikra, or ‘poor man’s caviar’, which utilizes peppers as well. A very German dish that you really must try is Zwiebelkuchen, or onion pie. It’s fantastic!

Also, visit my page on How To Grow Peppers From Seed for some great gardening tips, and you’ll learn about the medicinal value of peppers on my Benefits Of Peppers page. 

This post contains affiliate links. As an Amazon affiliate, I make a small commission at no extra cost to you if you make a qualifying purchase. See my full disclosure here.

Healthy Stuffed Peppers With Vegetable Sauce

If you’re having a pepper glut in your garden this year, welcome to the party! Mine are doing awesome this year, and I heard from others around me how well theirs did too. That’s perfect, and I gladly welcome this abundance with grateful open arms.

I’m a pepper lover and normally dedicate a long row to peppers. So that even in not so great years I get enough peppers to satisfy my pepper cravings. Hot peppers, sweet peppers, bells, roasters, fryers, you name it, and I likely have a variety planted. 

My favorites are sweet Ajvarski roasting peppers from Baker Creek, Jimmy Nardello frying peppers, and Corno Di Toro, mildly spicy bullshorn frying peppers.

For Hots I love the orange Datils, which are prolific, wicked hot, and wonderfully fruity (if you can taste it after getting your taste-buds scorched), milder Anchos, for roasting, stuffing, and Enchilada sauce, Serranos, Jalapenos, and the fantastic Leutschauer peppers for spicy paprika powder (they are quick to mature for you northerners, they were my best peppers and always turned red in Washington!). These are varieties I’ll definitely plant again next year. 

Check out my Pepper Growing Guide for lots of great gardening tips on growing peppers from seeds. 

What Peppers To Use For Stuffed Peppers

For these stuffed peppers I used mostly Jupiter Bell Peppers to stuff, and I threw a few roasting peppers, frying peppers and hot peppers into the sauce too.

You can use any roasting and frying peppers for the sauce and the sauce is great for using up those not so pretty peppers, where you need to cut out bad spots, or those twisted ones that are hard to work with otherwise.

I made two large batches of the sauce to stick some into the freezer for winter. It’s great on pasta and rice dishes, and if you add some bone broth, it makes a delicious creamy vegetable soup. Throw in some leftover rice and meat, and you’ve got a meal.

I also doubled the stuffing so I could freeze some, which will be great even without the peppers to eat with some other vegetables, or just the sauce on top.  

Why You’ll Love Stuffed Peppers With Vegetable Sauce

• The best part is that it tastes fantastic!

• It’s got so many great ingredients that are good for your health. 

• Peppers are packed with nutrients. They are high in antioxidants, which are known to provide immune support, fiber, vitamins, and minerals. They are attributed with supporting heart health, brain health, digestive health, and vision. And they might prevent certain cancers, and more. Check out my Benefits Of Peppers page if you’d like to know more!

• Pasture raised beef has powerful health benefits and nutrients that are not commonly found in any vegetables. And when beef is combined with vegetables, it provides a broad spectrum of essential nutrients that the body needs.

• Brown rice is naturally gluten free and a great source of vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Soak it at least overnight, or even better, 24 hours in water with a splash of apple cider vinegar, or you can soak the rice in whey, to remove the phytic acid, which can be harmful in large amounts and can prevent the body from utilizing the nutrients in your food.

• The sauce is made up of just vegetables, a little water, and a little salt and pepper. No fillers, no gluten. If you add sour cream, and I highly recommend it, it becomes outrageously delicious. 

• Sourcream adds some more protein and a delicious tang to the sauce. 

• This is a great make ahead dish. It tastes wonderful when reheated. 

• Make extra stuffed peppers and freeze a few by stuffing them tightly into a freezer safe dish or wrapping each individually in plastic film or parchment, to freeze for single portions. Defrost in the refrigerator and then reheat. 

• Make extra sauce to freeze for use with many dishes, or to turn into a nutritious creamy soup or soup base later with some added bone broth. The sauce freezes well too. I like to freeze mine without the sour cream.

How To Make Healthy Stuffed Peppers With Vegetable Sauce

Equipment

Large 7 quart dutch oven – You could use a casserole form that has a lid and fry your peppers in a frying pan, or use two smaller dutch ovens or any wide pot that can hold a few peppers. My 7 quart dutch oven held 10 peppers comfortably. They should pack in pretty tight, but not so that they break from getting wedged in too hard.

Saucepan – This is for cooking the rice, and if you like, and it’s large enough, you can use it for the sauce once the rice is finished. I used my 3 quart saucepan for the rice, but I used a 8 quart stock pot to make double the sauce recipe.

Large 10″ frying pan – You’ll be using this for frying the meat and mixing the stuffing later. If you use a skillet, be sure to use a sleeve on the handle as it get’s super hot.

A few bowls

Turner – For cooking the meat

Cutting Board

Blender or Immersion Blender, optional – You will need a blender to blend your vegetables into a sauce. An Immersion blender works well too.

Measuring cups – I like my quart size Anchor Hocking glass jug for measuring, but I don’t usually measure my veggies, I just kind of use what I have or what needs to be used up.

Large spoon

Ingredients

I like to mention how important it is to choose organically grown produce and ingredients whenever possible. Conventionally grown food is most often treated with toxic pesticides and other chemicals meant to prolong shelf life.

An organic label ensures that it will be non-GMO, and free from most harmful chemicals (the humidity sprayer in the vegetable section of the grocery stores also contains chemicals, so do watch for that). And Peppers just missed the dirty dozen list that is published by the EWG each year, by one spot! Besides that, in most cases, organically grown food has much better nutritional value, it’s food that will nourish and support our bodies.

For The Stuffed Peppers

Bell peppers – try to find nice boxy peppers with a flat bottom. How many you use will depend on your pan size and, of course, your family size, or appetite and you might want extras to freeze for later. I fit 10 peppers snugly into my 7 quart dutch oven. For more peppers, you could use a casserole dish with a lid, or a large wide stainless steel pot or two smaller pots. This recipe makes about 10 medium sized stuffed peppers.

Brown jasmine rice – You can use any long-grain rice, but I prefer jasmine rice for most dishes. It has a great texture and won’t turn mushy

Ground beef – I use pasture-raised and -finished. It’s well worth the extra money to me, and the health benefits much surpass beef that was finished in feedlots!

Onion – any onion works in this recipe.

Seasonings:

Garlic, Thyme, Cumin, Paprika, Pepper

Salt – I use Redmond’s Real Salt or Himalayan pink salt. They contain essential trace minerals that our bodies need, which I prefer as a healthier choice. I like to make each ingredient count!

Avocado or coconut oil – for frying the meat and the peppers.

For The Vegetable Sauce

Peppers – This sauce is great for using up your less than perfect peppers. I used any type that I needed to use up. I also threw in a few hot peppers as well, because I like spicy food. And use your scraps from hollowing the peppers too unless you want to use them as caps on your stuffed pepper dish.

Tomatoes – Juicy ones work great here, we’ll want the sauce not too thick.

Carrots – I don’t peel mine, I just brush them in a bowl of water and cut out bad spots before adding them to the pot.

Beets (optional)– This is not part of the original recipe, I just add a few if I have some in the garden for another nutritional boost and some extra color.

Celery stalks and leaves – I grow cutting celery, and that provides mostly leaves, not much stem. But the leaves are the most flavorful and very nutritious. If yours taste very strong, use them sparingly.

Onion – Any onion will do. I just use ones that are ready in the garden.

Garlic – Use as many as you like! I love lots of garlic in this sauce.

Carrot greens, parsley, oregano, and/or dill – just pick a small handful of your favorite herbs. If your carrot tops are nice looking, you can sure use those for a great flavor.

Salt and Pepper – to taste. You can add a little salt right at the start, and adjust when finished. It’s hard to say how much salt to add, so go by taste, same with the pepper.

Sour cream – This gives the sauce the finishing touch and turns it into a wicked delicious sauce. I used heavy cream, that I cultured by adding a few spoonfuls of whey.

Instructions For Making Healthy Stuffed Peppers With Vegetable Sauce

Cook The Rice

I like to cook the rice first and prep the veggies while the rice cooks. 

Add the water and some salt to the pot and bring it to a boil. 

Add the rice, cover the pot tightly and reduce the heat to low.

Cook for about 30 minutes or till the water is absorbed. You’ll want the rice to be a bit on the firm side, al dente. Fluff it up with a fork and set it aside without a lid to cool slightly.

Prep the Bell Peppers while the rice cooks 

Cut around the stem end and pull the seed cavity out by the stem.

You’ll have a hollowed out pepper now. Reach in carefully and pull out any ribs that remained and shake out the seeds. Set it into a bowl and proceed with the rest of the peppers. 

Once done, sprinkle a little salt on the inside of the peppers to season them.

Drain them upside down in a strainer or a bowl. Pour the salty draining water into the sauce if you get a lot. 

Next work on the meat 

Add the oil to the frying pan and heat it till the oil gets very hot. Place the meat into it and brown it well.

Add the onions and brown them with the meat. Turn the heat down a little and cook till the onions are soft.

Add the garlic and stir-fry for a minute.

Season the meat and turn off the burner or take the pan off the hot plate. 

Add the rice to the meat and mix well. Taste and adjust the seasonings. 

Prep the sauce ingredients

Use any pepper prepping scraps as part of your sauce veggies. Use any not so nice bell peppers for the sauce, if you had some culls. You’ll need about 3 cups of chopped peppers. Don’t worry about exact measurements and chop them coarsely, they’ll get blended later. I like to have a mix of red and green peppers in the sauce. 

If you used a 3 quart pot to make your rice, you can use it to make your sauce. It’s ok if there is a bit of starch left in it. But you can wipe it out if you want. I usually make 2-3 times the amount of sauce, so I can freeze some. For that reason, I use a big 8 quart stock pot. 

Chop the tomatoes, onions, celery, garlic, and carrots and add everything to your saucepot.

Add any greens you like to include. I find the celery greens enough, and sometimes I only have celery greens to add and no stalks, which is ok too. If I have nice carrot tops on those carrots, I’ll add those too. Parsley, dill, cilantro, papalo, oregano, all will work. Use your favorites. 

Season with some pepper and salt (you can use the draining water from the peppers instead of salt), add the water, cover the pot, and put it on a medium-high heat till it simmers.

Then turn the heat down and simmer it on low for about 30-45 minutes or till all veggies are very soft. 

Meanwhile assemble your stuffed peppers

First heat the dutch oven with some coconut oil or avocado oil. Let it get just to smoking hot. 

Now fry a batch of peppers by laying them on their side into the hot frying oil. Be very careful, splatters are likely and you can get burnt. When the sides are scorched, turn the peppers and scorch all 4 sides this way. It should only take less than a minute per side if your pan is very hot. 

Put them aside and cook the next batch of peppers that way until they are all done.

Now add stuffing to the peppers. I like to push it in to firm it a little, but you don’t want to push hard. The rice might expand a little still when the stuffed peppers are baking and the peppers might break apart if you have the filling pressed in too tight. 

Next place the peppers back into the dutch oven standing on their bottoms and crowd the pan well so they don’t fall over. Fit as many as possible. 

Add just a quarter to half cup of water to the bottom of the pot. Place it into the oven and cook on medium or 375℉ until the peppers are soft and well heated through, about an hour. 

Your sauce ingredients should be getting done before the peppers are.

Turn off the heat and use an immersion blender to blend it all smooth.

Mine will leave some chunks, so I prefer to blend it in a blender, not that chunks are bad, but with this sauce I really prefer it smooth. 

Put it all back into the pot and bring it back up to simmer. Turn the heat down to keep it just at or below a simmer to keep it hot till meal time.

Just before serving, add the sour cream and adjust the seasonings. It really depends on your taste, how much sour cream you want to add. I like mine creamy, but not too much. So I’d put about half a cup to one cup into this amount of sauce. Start with a little and taste it to see if you want to add more. 

To serve, I actually like to put some sauce without the sour cream on a plate, swirl a little sour cream in it and put a stuffed pepper on top to serve. Sprinkle some parsley over it all, and it will look so pretty. 

Variations

Add Salami: My mom used to chop up a few ounces of salami to add when browning the beef for a really great flavor. I love making it that way, but I can’t find good salami around here that doesn’t have some weird ingredients in it, so I left it out. But I wanted to mention it in case you would like to make it that way. It’s delicious!

Use The Pepper Tops: You can place the tops from the bell peppers back on just before baking them, so they will have hats. Just cut the seed cavity off first.

Unstuffed Pepper Dinner: Here is what I did when I had a hankering for this dish but not enough time to prep it all. I’d just chop the peppers and fry them in the pan together with the meat and onions. Once that’s done, mix in the cooked rice, and serve it with the same easy gravy. Quick and easy and just as delicious, if maybe a little less spectacular 😁.

Substitute For Bell Peppers: Use the same recipe minus the peppers, to make stuffed cabbage, chard, or collards. Just blanch large leaves of greens and roll up some stuffing in them, bake and serve with the vegetable sauce.

Make A Soup: Use the vegetable sauce as a base for a creamy vegetable soup.

Other Uses For The Sauce: Use The Sauce with a baked potato or pasta.

Enjoy Your Healthy Stuffed Peppers With Vegetable Sauce! 

Now you’ll get to eat one of the greatest meals ever invented in my humble opinion. I will always think back to my early days whenever I make this dish. The enticing aroma and the delicious flavors just do so much to transport me back in time.

I think food has so much power in our lives and making nutrient dense comfort foods from scratch like this dinner will go a long way to keep a family connected with dinner times together and cozy scents in the air. I hope you get to try this fantastic homemade and maybe homegrown dish and maybe you’ll put this on your favorites list too! I’d be thrilled! 

Let me hear about it if you get to make this delicious stuffed peppers dinner. And tell me, if you feel the same about food being a great way to keep a family knitted together. And please don’t hesitate to ask in the comments if you have any questions!

Join the Food For Life Garden Community for more great recipes and homestead tips and ideas. I’m always adding new content. Don’t miss any new posts and learn more about my off-grid farm life.

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Grow your own peppers from seeds – Your complete guide to growing peppers. From selecting seeds to planting, growing, companion planting, and harvesting. Find out the benefits of growing your own peppers and how to preserve them.

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Large 7 quart dutch oven
Farberware saucepan
Large 10″ frying pan
Sleeve
Blender
Immersion blender
Anchor Hocking glass jug
Redmond’s Real Salt
Himalayan pink salt

Pepper Seeds:

Ajvarski
Jimmy Nardello
Corno Di Toro
Datils
Anchos
Serranos,
Jalapenos
Leutschauer
Pepper Growing Guide
Jupiter Bell Peppers