Meatless Monday: Stuffed Poblano Peppers

I went out on a limb for this one because I made these knowing that my husband doesn't like peppers and/or onions. (Also, I want to apologize for the picture, it's not the best.) I really enjoyed this meal, you could easily add meat to these or even just eat them as a side dish but I ate them as my meal. And when I say "I" I mean just me, first my son tried them he was ok with the rice filling but didn't care for the pepper and basically Nic had the same reaction. His thought was they would be really good if I didn't use the pepper. Anyway.

I would say that Poblano peppers are by far my favorite type of pepper. Especially when roasted. I did roast my peppers before stuffing them, but you don't have too. After I roasted them, I placed them in a bowl covered in plastic wrap and let them sweat so I was able to easily remove the skin. Once the skin is removed I carefully cut the peppers in half and removed the seeds. Then just spoon the filling in the pepper halves.

For the filling, I cooked 1 cup of white rice. While the rice cooked I sautéd onions, garlic and some left over pepper in some olive oil. I then added the rice, corn and some taco seasoning. Mixed well, removed from heat and stirred in some Colby-Jack cheese. Once in the pepper I sprinkled more cheese on top.
Bake at 350 degrees until cheese is melted, then add some taco or hot sauce on top after it is out of the oven. Serve with a green salad.

Options that I would do if I was just eating them (and I would have done this if I new it would just be me) is add black beans to the mixture to make it more hardy.

Homemade Blueberry Pop-tarts

When it is gloomy I tend to get on a baking kick, it has been super wet the last few weeks and finally it is sunny and nice. Fall.

Well this post is over due, I actually made these two weeks ago. I have seen recipes before but what finally gave me a push was the September version of the Food Network Magazine (FNM). My version is slightly different, FNM uses grape jelly and an orange glaze. I am sure that would be delicious, but I had some fresh/frozen blueberries so I made my own blueberry filling. My husband has been taking samples of my baked items to work for the guys. The next requested version of these will be with a nutella filling.

Here is the adapted version:

For the tarts:
3 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
4 tbsp shortening, cold and cut in small pieces
2 sticks butter, cold and cut in small pieces
1/2 cup blueberry purée (directions follow)
1 large egg
1/2 milk

Pulse flour, sugar and salt in food processor until combined. Add shortening and about one-quarter of the butter and pulse until they disappear in the flour. Add remaining butter and pulse until it looks like course meal with pea size pieces of butter. Add 1/2 cup ice water and pulse a couple times until dough comes together. Turn out on to plastic wrap, form into a disk and chill at least an hour up to one day.
While the dough is in the refrigerator prepare the blueberry filling.

Blueberry filling:
1-1 1/2 cups blueberries
2 tsp sugar
2 tbsp cornstarch

In a small sauce pan, on medium-low heat, heat the blueberries and sugar until the blueberries break down. About 30 min. Remove from heat and stir in cornstarch stirring consistently until the sauce is thick. Set aside to cool.

Roll out the chilled dough to about 1/4 inch thick and cut into 3 x 4 pieces. You should end up with about 12 total. Spoon out about a tablespoon of the filling and place in the center of one rectangle. Brush the edge with egg and lay another rectangle in top, using a fork press the edges. Brush with a mix of milk and egg. Repeat until all six are made. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes or until golden brown.