You ever have one of those days where you haven’t gone to the grocery store in a week, and now you need to come up with something for dinner?  It’s like an episode of a cooking competition.  “Take these four wild ingredients, and make something delicious!”  Today’s random ingredients: chorizo, mini sweet peppers, rice, and eggs.

Erica and I have stuffed mini peppers with bacon fried rice before, so I immediately thought of chorizo fried rice!  Who doesn’t love a latin/asian infusion? The great thing about stuffing little peppers, instead of a whole bell pepper, is that they are a nice appetizer bite.  You also get a little better portion of each flavor, instead of one bite having too much pepper and the next with way too much stuffing.  The sweetness of these little babies also perfectly balances the spiciness of the chorizo and rice.

These are a great appetizer, but they also work as a light meal if paired with a fresh salad.  Whatever you make them for, I’m pretty sure these would do well in any cooking competition.

Ingredients:

• 10 mini sweet peppers
• 1 cup jasmine rice
• 1 T butter
• 8 oz chorizo
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tomato, diced
• 1 T hoisin sauce
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Cook the rice according to package directions.  Add salt and butter to water with rice if desired.  While the rice cooks, put the chorizo in a large skillet or wok.  After 3-4 minutes, when the fat starts to render out, add garlic and tomato.  Cook until the chorizo is done.  When the rice is cooked, add it to the wok along with salt, pepper, cumin, smoked paprika, hoisin, and soy sauce.  Mix together and cook for 2-3 minutes.

Cut the stem off each mini pepper, and clean out the insides.  Scoop rice and chorizo mix inside until it heaps over each pepper.  I cooked these in a muffin pan, where they could lean against the side, with 2-3 peppers in each hole depending on size.  This kept them upright and the filling stayed inside.  Cook at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes.  You want the peppers to be soft and cooked through, and the very top of the rice to be crispy while the rest is moist and delicious.

Devour!