Bacon and cream cheese stuffed sweet peppers
Ever since being discharged from the hospital, I’ve been itching to cook but everyone (especially the lovely ladies at Singapore Home Cooks!) has been telling me to close my kitchen and rest.
I felt fine after taking Tramadol as painkillers for the first day but found that it caused me to have shallow breathing – that’s one of its side effects. But being someone with a slight anxiety disorder, the symptoms were getting too familiar. The weak breathing reminded me too much of having an anxiety attack. In order not to confuse my brain, I decided to put myself off Tramadol and just take Panadeine, which really isn’t of much use in relieving the pain.
I haven’t really cooked for the past week. Ok, I tried to cook on Wednesday (I was discharged on Tuesday) but felt so useless after feeling tired cooking ONE airfried salmon dish. I tried again to fix a pasta dinner on Friday but it took me so much effort just to cook penne. I stopped cooking and went back to bed, super disappointed and dejected like WHEN WILL I BE A NORMAL HUMAN BEING AGAIN?
It didn’t help that the next day, my aunt decided to tempt me to cook by buying home a gorgeous head of USA purple cauliflower and some sweet mini peppers.
I sent the husband to go get some bacon from the supermarket, because I knew exactly what I wanted to make with those sweet peppers!
I didn’t want something too complicated or labour intensive so cream cheese stuffed peppers sounded perfect. I gave Jason instructions to make a cream cheese dip with fried bacon, garlic, chopped spring onions, some truffle salt and a little bit of lemon juice. Mix it all up like so:
The peppers were then sliced lengthwise and seeds removed. We stuffed the filling into the cavity of each pepper, wrapped them with bacon, then baked the whole lot in a preheated 190C oven for 22 minutes, until the bacon were crisped. We baked them in the oven so we could make more at a go, but you could make these in the airfryer too, at 160C for 12 minutes. We tried both methods and preferred the baked ones, although the airfryer was a real timesaver.
I remember having a similar version at one of the hippy cafes recently but because they used Jalapeno peppers, the heat was too much for me to take. Making these with sweet peppers was just perfect. You could also make a meat stuffing and top with mozzarella cheese. Or leave the crunchy peppers raw and fill them with cold chicken mayonnaise. I think that’ll just be as interesting.
My family loved these.. 88 even asked for second and third helpings! Thank you to the husband for taking instructions so well.. but sigh! I can’t wait to cook again!
Serves: 3-4
Total cost per stuffed pepper: $0.70
What you need:
12 pieces sweet mini peppers, halved and seeds removed (total 24 portions)
227g cream cheese (1 block)
15 slices bacon
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Half teaspoon salt (I used Italian black truffle sea salt from iherb)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons chopped spring onions
Half teaspoon olive oil
Steps:
Preheat your oven to 190C or AF to 160C.
Divide the bacon into 12+3 slices. Cut 12 slices into two and set aside (total 24 portions). For the remaining three slices, chop into small pieces.
In a shallow pan, add the olive oil and fry the chopped bacon til just starting to crisp. Add the chopped garlic and fry together til garlic is golden. Set aside.
In a large bowl, combine the cream cheese (microwave for a few seconds if not soft enough to handle), bacon + garlic, lemon juice, salt and chopped spring onions. Mix well.
Spoon into each cavity, wrap with half a slice of bacon and arrange on a baking tray. Spray the surface with some olive oil. Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes til bacon is crispy, but If using the airfryer, AF for 10-12 minutes. Cool slightly before serving. Be careful as filling will be hot.
How much I spent:
$4 for sweet peppers
$3.25 for cream cheese
$8 for bacon
Everything else from my pantry
