The Stuffed Peppers That Weren’t

Grand plans I have in this kitchen of mine. Stuffing pepper boats with a wheat berry salad popped into my mind sometime last week, and on our adventure in Market Basket, I picked up all of the necessary ingredients.

Wheat berries were soaked overnight. I feel no need to even cook them; I like them just chewy enough. No, I love them. I am becoming obsessed with wheat berries.

wheat berries

When I started prepping the poblano peppers for roasting, I started to think they were a little small for stuffing, but figured I would just top them with the salad.

poblano peppers

Until they came out of the oven. I should have taken an after photo, because it was quite pathetic. They shrunk and flattened, losing about 1/4 of their already paltry size. There would be no stuffing, so I decided on a simple salad using the planned ingredients.

After chopping and sautéing butternut squash until soft,  I tossed it with the room temperature wheat berries.

butternut squash

I also used my trusty veggie scissors to cut the shrunken peppers.

wheat berry salad

I tossed the salad with goat cheese and added a few scoops to a bed of Olivia’s Organics herb salad blend, my favorite boxed salad ever.

Olivia's Organics herb salad

Wouldn’t that have been a great stuffing for roasted pepper boats? I thought so.

The roasted peppers were intensely flavorful with a nice spice to them, and it worked so well with the goat cheese, sweet squash, and herbaceous salad. I have seen lots of people tweeting about looking for healthy recipes, and I would highly recommend this one. I topped it with a few spoonfuls of jarred salsa verde to add even more of a kick, then devoured two whole plates.

I have seriously been adding wheat berries to everything, oatmeal, yogurt, salads, and soups. They are delightfully nutty and chewy and a great whole grain.

Have you developed any new favorite healthy recipes in the New Year as we all detox from the holidays?

Tags: cooking, Food, healthy eating, healthy recipes, recipe, salad, wheat berries

  1. blog is the new black’s avatar

    Looks great! I’ve been lightening up my recipes a tad, for sure!

    Reply

  2. Michelle’s avatar

    Sometimes life hands you lemons (or shrunken poblanos) and you gotta make lemonade! Great back-up plan with all of those yummy ingredients…and I agree that they would have made a great stuffing for peppers!

    Reply

  3. Heather’s avatar

    I am not the biggest fan of stuffed pepper – and am very anti-green peppers for some reason.

    I love wheatberries and have a giant bag of them in my freezer – I need to prepare some and add them to my oatmeal – they add a great chew!

    Reply

  4. Roxan’s avatar

    I’ve never tried wheat berries before, thinking i already had enough bags of grains in my cupboard. But after reading your love for them, I think it’s time I try them out! Pretty cool how you don’t have to cook them if you soak them long enough. Sorry to hear that the peppers shrank so much but i think your detoured end result still looks delicious!

    Reply

  5. Megan’s avatar

    I kind of think the salad sounds better than the original idea! I love that herb salad too.

    P.S. I have some charcoal wheat. No idea what to do with it… remind me, and I’ll give it to you.

    Reply

  6. Molly Parr’s avatar

    I ran into the EXACT same problem with my poblano peppers I got from a CSA earlier this year. In fact, butternut squash was also involved, but instead of what berries, I used quinoa. I also did what I could, but was totally bummed that my plans were thwarted by that fickle pepper.

    Reply

  7. MelissaNibbles’s avatar

    I’ve never tried wheat berries. What do they taste like?

    Reply

    1. traveleatlove’s avatar

      They are a little nutty. They make me think of brown rice and maybe toasted oats, and I like that they are smaller than rice. If you don’t cook them, they are slightly chewy and add a nice texture to salads.

      Reply

    2. Jolene (www.everydayfoodie.ca)’s avatar

      The hubby and I have had a few vegetarian, and healthy meals since the start of 2011 as a way to re-charge and detox from the cheese and bacon of December 🙂

      Reply

    3. Elizabeth’s avatar

      That mixture sounds delicious. I would totally set out to make this as a salad and not even bother stuffing it into peppers.

      Reply

    4. alicia’s avatar

      I’m pretty much obsessed with that winter salad…..I need to get some wheat berries – the farro is top notch….and it looks the same. I’m convinced they’re the same thing.

      Reply

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