Successful Crock Pot Experiment: Southwestern Turkey Stuffed Peppers

Wednesday nights are hard when it comes to planning dinner. Bob is home with the kids and I don't get home until late. So it falls to him to provide nourishment for the family. I have to leave a detailed note of what Bob is to make the kids for lunch, dinner and snacks. Otherwise, as Bob says, he would just stand clueless in front of the open fridge and spin in hopeless circles; cooking is just NOT his forte. More often than not, dinner will consist of some shape of pasta and sauce and Perdue turkey meatballs. Maybe a bag of frozen veggies if we're lucky. It is difficult to decide what he should make. He can handle a simple hot dog and bean casserole (a.k.a. beanie weenie). Or we have reheated meals which I have in the freezer. Occasionally I can get him to make a salad. Being tired of coming home after a long day to beanie weenie and the like, I turned to my trusty crock pot last night and created a concoction that worked really well! All Bob had to do was to plug in the crock pot; I had to leave multiple notes and he still turned it on 1/2 hour late but all ended up ok in the end.

"Southwestern" Turkey Stuffed Peppers


This turned out great and I didn't have to use a lot of turkey. Beans and corn really stretched the meal, and make it healthier too!

Four large red peppers, tops cut off and seeded (save the tops)
1 can drained and rinsed black beans
3/4 cup frozen corn
1/2 lb. ground turkey
1/2 cup uncooked white rice
garlic powder, salt, chili powder
1 cup chunky salsa, divided (I used mild since the kids were eating it)
1/2 cup shredded low-fat Mexican cheese blend.

Mix together in bowl: beans, corn, turkey, rice, 1/4 cup salsa, and then salt, garlic powder and chili powder. I probably used only about a few sprinkles of each seasoning, but you can adjust to taste.

stuff peppers with meat mixture. top each pepper with some cheese and then top with the reserved pepper top. place in crock pot. pour remaining salsa over top, add about 1/2 cup water and cover. Cook on high power for 4-5 hours, depending on your crock pot. I have to say that my crock pot cooks very hot. also I stuffed the peppers and put it all together in the crockpot the night before. I don't know if the rice cooked better because it had time to soak up some liquid as it sat.

One more note: I actually only made 2 peppers last night; the kids don't like cooked pepper so i took some of the turkey mixture, added a little bit of bread crumbs and then formed it into a loaf. i poured some of the salsa over it and cooked it right along with the peppers. I didn't see the final result but I know the baby ate it! A meal is always a success if one kid likes it.

Beans and Rice are Nice!

I've been trying to figure out ways to cut costs on food AND get out of the meal rut at home. I get tired of making the same things over and over again. When we were all in Florida a few weeks back, Bob and I got a chance to eat out at a Cuban restaurant and had black bean soup over rice. Now, I remember my mom making that at home when I was a kid. I actually did a lot of the cooking once my mom went back to work full time (My mom gave me the choice of cooking or washing the dishes). So black bean soup and rice was really easy for me to put together. Heat up two cans of soup, serve over white rice, and top with some chopped sweet onion. Voila!

So last week I opened up a couple cans of Goya black bean soup for the family, served over some white basmati rice. I put a plateful in front of the baby. I then turned around to get Amy a drink and turned back around and all the beans were gone from Samantha's plate! Same thing happened for another plateful and a half. She just inhaled it! Now I know Samantha loves rice but she loved the beans even more! So I considered this a success. My older daughter of course ate the rice. And a few leaves of baby spinach (dipped in ketchup, of course). I think the next time I make this, I may just have to make my own black bean soup. The Goya soup had over 1000 mg of salt per serving (a wee bit too much, in my opinion). Otherwise this was a good source of fiber and protein and was low fat (and easy and cheap!). One of my crock pot books has a great recipe for Cuban Black Bean Soup. It freezes really well.