Homegrown Italian Roasting peppers are substantial and sweet. Perfect for the grill, stuffed with what? Weeds from my yard, of course!
A few weeks ago, I picked the last harvest from my pepper patch. There were some big, sweet, mature Italian Roasting peppers in there. I've kept them in the cool Oregon humidity on my open back porch since then, waiting for something special. And there you go - culinary challenge #6 and who is the judge - who? None other than @papa-pepper. How could I not grill these peppers?
So I wanted to make Stuffed Grilled Peppers. The question, is what will I stuff them with? Of course, the answer is weeds! The grilled peppers will have a sweet, smoky flavor, so I wanted some weeds that would stand up well to that. My choice? Wild chives, wild field mustard, and garden escape artist Jerusalem artichokes. Neither chives nor field mustard are hot, but they do have substantial flavor. The Jerusalem artichokes, when lightly cooked so they are still crisp, have a wonderful substantial smoky flavor themselves.
The challenge said this was supposed to be a main course. So I added two tins of Golden Smoked Herring to my weeds. I chopped the chives and field mustard very fine. I chopped the Jerusalem artichokes into small pieces, too. I used the smaller tubers that I found, because I didn't need to peel them for this recipe. I will tell you that those 4 ingredients mixed together, with the liquid form the tins of fish, is wonderful! Uncooked, by itself, that would make a great salad!
So then I just carefully cut the tops off the peppers and took out the seeds. Because the peppers are fully ripe, I am saving these seeds for planting next year. These are great peppers and I want to keep growing them.
I stuffed the peppers with my weed mix. I made sure to get the stuffing all the way to the bottom of the peppers. And I packed those peppers tight. I ended up using all of the stuffing. Then I put the caps back on the peppers and stuffed my peppers into some grill cages that were just the right size. If these peppers had been a half-inch longer, they wouldn't have fit. But fit they did - just right!
While I was preparing my peppers, I was also getting a good bed of coals in one of my outdoor fire areas. This is an old freestanding metal fireplace that I have on a stand. It's great this time of year, because the fire is higher off the ground. So the heat it throws out is higher, too - just right for sitting around the fire when it's cold.
Once the coals were set, I propped the grill cages on top of a couple fire-bricks in the fireplace. And let them cook. The goal is to cook the peppers slow enough to cook the stuffing, but to also char the outside skin of the pepper. I hung out by the fire and turned the grill cages, so that all four sides got charred by the coals. It took less than 20 minutes. I was glad it wasn't raining, like it has for about 90% of the days since October 1st, here in Oregon's Willamette Valley.
Once the peppers were cooked through, I brought the cages back into the kitchen and covered them with a towel. That lets the heat and moisture of the hot peppers loosen the charred skin on the peppers. While I was waiting, I grilled some polenta over the coals, too. And made a simple salad of chopped dandelion greens and an elephant garlic vinaigrette.
It only takes about 5 minutes under the towel for the pepper skins to loosen up. Then I removed the peppers from the grill cages and peeled off the charred skin, which was now loose. That leaves a soft, sweet pepper with a wonderful smoky char flavor. It really gets the best flavor out of these Italian roasters.
Then I had a great dinner, an absolutely great dinner. The Jerusalem artichokes were just right - still a little crispy, with their smoky flavor fully developed. The smoky flavors of the herring and the grilled peppers went together perfectly - and the greens inside had enough flavor to come through, too. With a little cabernet and dried homegrown figs, this was a meal good enough to serve company. If I had this at restaurant, I'd be really happy. Highly, highly recommended!
What Do You Think?
Have you grown or used this kind of large Italian Roasting Pepper? Do you like grilled peppers? Would you eat this dinner, even with weeds in it? Do you eat wild field mustard or dandelion greens? I want to hear from you!
I write about foraging because I believe that we can all have lives that are richer, more secure, more grounded, and more interesting by getting to know the plants and the land around us – in our yards, our parks, and our wilderness.
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*** foraging, gardening, nature, simple living close to the land ***
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*** foraging, gardening, nature, simple living close to the land ***