Gluten-Free Crockpot Stuffed Peppers

This past month has been a hodge-podge of last minute meals.  Time to get back to menu planning.  I like to plan menus around what's growing in the garden, sales and coupons.  I also plan to use up leftovers and knowing what's for dinner avoids that last minute scramble to get something, anything on the table.

This Week's Menus

• Swedish Meatballs (Ikea), boiled potatoes, cinnamon honey carrots
• Pork Loin Roast, baked sweet potatoes, corn
• Stuffed Peppers in the Crockpot, mashed potatoes
• Crockpot Greek Lemon Chicken, rice, home canned green beans
• Pulled Pork sandwiches from leftover pork roast, cole slaw, 3 bean salad

I got the pork loin roast on a buy-one-get-one-free sale and the ground sirloin was free with a coupon when I bought both hamburger buns and beans.  LOVE those kind of deals!

Stuffed Peppers in the Crockpot with OAMC* option
Serves 4 - 8

4 bell peppers
1 lb. ground sirloin
1 cup cold cooked rice
3 tablespoons dried minced onion (or 1 cup very finely minced fresh onion)
2 garlic cloves, grated on the microplane
1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons gluten-free quick oats
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 (26 oz.) jar traditional style pasta sauce (not marinara - it will get watery)

Spray interior of crockpot with non-stick.  Reserve 1/2 cup of pasta sauce and pour remaining sauce into crockpot.

Cut tops off peppers.  Discard stems, keep tops and mince.  Discard seeds.  Check to see if pepper will stand upright.  If it won't, trim the base without cutting through to center, so it will stand upright.

In a large bowl, combine beef, cooked rice, pepper tops, onion, garlic, Italian seasoning, egg, breadcrumbs, salt, pepper and 1/2 cup of the pasta sauce.  Mix well.

Fill each pepper with meat mixture, pressing firmly, mounding it on top. *Prepare to this point for OAMC; tightly wrap individually in plastic, place in ziptop bag and freeze.  Unwrap frozen and thaw upright before proceeding.

Place peppers into crockpot.  Spoon some of the sauce onto each.

Cook on Low 6 - 8 hours or on High 4 - 6 hours.  Test temperature for doneness at minimum time.

Leftovers reheat well in microwave.

*Once A Month Cooking

Monday, Menu-day

Monday again.  We have a few dinners out this week.  It makes menu planning easier.


I found vacuum packed mushroom ravioli at Aldi.  It got me thinking about a dish I used to get at Millennium, a now closed, but fondly remembered restaurant.  Tonight I boiled the ravioli and created a Creamy Baby Bella Sauce.  While the dried ravioli is not nearly as luscious as the hand filled wild mushroom ravioli at Millennium; this sauce is very good:

Creamy Baby Bella Sauce
8 ounces cremini (baby portabella) mushrooms
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon butter
1 - 2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon flour
1 1/2 cups milk
pinch salt

Wash mushrooms under running water*and tumble onto a clean kitchen towel as each one is cleaned.   Snap off stems and discard.  They are edible, but too fibrous to enjoy.  Pat caps dry with towel.  Slice 1/4" thick.

Heat a pan over medium flame.  Add oil and butter.  Swirl to combine.
Add the mushrooms and garlic. Cook, stirring occasionally until mushrooms are tender.

Sprinkle with flour and stir to wet the flour with the oil.  Cook and stir 2 minutes to cook the flour.

Add about half of the milk.  Stir and cook until it starts to thicken, stir in remaining milk.  Cook and stir until it bubbles and thickens.  Stir in a pinch of salt and serve.

Why 2 additions?  If we add all the milk at once it would take a long time for it to come up to a boil and it would thicken oddly.  The flour could become grainy, or worse, lumpy in all that liquid.  Adding it in batches helps create a silky smooth sauce.  There is probably some food chemistry related reason.  I just know it works.

* FOOD MYTH: Washing mushrooms causes them them to soak up water and become rubbery.  FALSE!  Don't believe me?  Ask Alton Brown.  He did an episode of Good Eats where he weighed several piles of mushrooms then cleaned them by various methods and re-weighed them afterwards.  Neither rinsing under running water or soaking in water 5 minutes caused any measurable weight gain.  So wash your mushrooms and avoid grit in your sauce.

This Weeks Menus

Monday  Mushroom Ravioli with Creamy Baby Bella Sauce and Roasted Broccoli

Tuesday  Just Like Thanksgiving Turkey Meatloaf, Mashies, Veg
Note to self: make extra mashies for Wednesday
This is a new-to-me recipe found at TasteofHome.com.  I'll let you know how it turns out.

Wednesday  Shepherd's Pie
This uses up leftover mashies from Tuesday and leftover beef tips which I made last week when it was too cold to grill Walt's 'birthday' steaks.

Thursday  Dinner out
Meet the parents.  Our son is newly engaged and we get to meet her parents.  She's such a sweetheart that I'm sure we'll love them.

Friday  Walt is attending a men's event at church - so I'll be free to eat what I like...

Saturday  Dinner with friends

Sunday  Omaha Steaks on the grill, Saddleback Potatoes
Second attempt!  Last week it was too cold to grill those steaks Walt got with a birthday gift card.  We've never indulged in Omaha Steaks before, so we're excited to try them. The anticipation is killing us...

This Week's Menus

I tend to scribble my weekly menu on a sheet of paper.  This can be annoying when I go shopping and forget a key ingredient.  So I've started noting menus on my shopping list.  But then I get home from the grocery store and toss the shopping list in the trash. At the end of the week, I'm scratching my head and wondering WHY I bought cottage cheese.  Maybe this will help.

Monday - 3 Ingredient Cranberry Chicken, rice, roasted broccoli
Tuesday - Warm Leftover Steak Strips on tossed salad, homemade bread
Wednesday - Pastitsio Pie, salad, carrots
Thursday - leftover Cranberry Chicken
Friday - Roast Pork Tenderloin, sweet potatoes, green beans
Heads up: Jewel has Hormel pork tenderloin BOGO through Thursday this week.
Saturday - leftover Pastitsio
Sunday - Beef tenderloin steaks on the grill, saddleback potatoes, carrots
Bought with an Omaha Steaks gift certificate that was a very welcome birthday gift to Walt!  I see another yummy leftover steak salad possibility for later in the week.
Monday - 3 Ingredient Pulled Pork in the Crockpot, Asian Coleslaw
Yep - another leftover night!

What's cooking in Your Kitchen?