Stuffed giant peppers

When life gives you giant peppers, make the best of it. I think that is my new motto that inspired me to make this dish of char-grilled giant lamuyo peppers stuffed with a juicy barley risotto. It is a great winter dish and just to my taste. It's savoury due to the mushroom barley risotto with the sweetness and smokiness of the grilled peppers. The flavours are really great and it's not too complicated to make either, so give it a go!

Ingredients

2 large lamuyo peppers

2 tbsp groudnut oil for grilling

2 shallots

3 garlic cloves

3 tbsp olive oil

10 g dried porcini

2 tbsp vegetable stock powder + 1l water

3 tbsp fresh parsley leaves

25 g butter

1 dl white wine

100 g pearl barley

100 g emmental

1 tsp salt

1 tsp black pepper

Method

First of all prepare the vegetable stock for the risotto. Combine the vegetable stock powder with about one liter water and some parsley leaves and heat it up. Chop the shallots and garlic and crush the dried porcini mushrooms a little and then soak them in water for about 10 minutes.

Then just make a barley risotto with the basic risotto method. Heat the olive oil in a pan and sweat the shallots and garlic cloves lightly. Remove the soaking fluid of the porcini (the fluid can be added to the vegetable stock as it will have a lovely mushroom taste) and also add them to the pan for a further minute. Add the butter and once it has melted, the pearl barley. Stir for a couple of minutes and then make the wine addition. Let the wine evaporate and add the first couple of ladles of hot vegetable stock. Let the risotto simmer under lid, stir often and keep making vegetable stock additions until the pearl barley is tender and the risotto has developed a nice mushroomy taste.

While the risotto is simmering, prepare the peppers. Remove the seeds and the top part of the peppers as a small lid, and then char-grill the pieces on each side until they are getting soft and have the distinct grilling marks. Then set the peppers to side.

Once the barley risotto is nearly done, grate the emmental and add it to the barley, also season with salt, pepper and parsley and stir. Take the char-grilled peppers and hide some emmental pieces on the bottom of them. Then stuff them with the barley risotto and place the lids back on them. Bake the stuffed peppers at 180C for about 10 minutes.

Serve hot as a winter warmer and enjoy!

Your VegHog