Cooking rice in a bell pepper seems like something only worthy of gastronomic magic, but the grandmothers from Alicante and Valencia, and certainly their grandmothers too, were well versed in the cooking techniques of "bajoques farcides" (stuffed peppers). It is a dish that impresses with its mixture of subtle flavors.
In the past, however, no one would have imagined that it could be cooked in a kamado without wrapping the peppers in aluminum foil to prevent them from losing moisture during the cooking process. Here is the recipe from Jonatan Armengol:
To start, prepare the filling. To do this, fry the meat in oil, e.g. in a cast-iron pan, until browned. Remove the meat from the pan and fry the chopped tomatoes for approx. 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, heat the Kamado Monolith to 250° C.
After approx. 5 minutes, deglaze the tomatoes with the white wine. Once the alcohol has evaporated, add the meat, mix well and season with salt. Then add the rice and fry for a few minutes.
Next, cut the top off the bell pepper and scoop out the seeds. To do this, carefully remove all the seeds and white strips from the inside of the bell pepper. The peppers are best cooked in a clay pot, e.g. a Roman pot, which fits into the kamado so that the smoke flavors can penetrate the peppers.
Fill the hollowed-out peppers with the rice and meat mixture and place upright in the high baking dish. It is important that the contents are not compressed, otherwise the pods could burst due to the swelling rice.
Pour water or meat stock into the pan to a level of approx. 3 - 5 cm. With the kamado, there is no need to wrap the pods in aluminum foil, as this gives them the smoky flavors that the kamado imparts.
Put the lids back on the peppers and secure them with a few toothpicks if necessary. Be careful, if a bell pepper falls over, it will lose liquid inside and the filling will not cook. It is therefore best to place as many peppers as necessary in the dish so that they hold each other.
Now place the clay dish in the hot kamado and cook for between 90 and 120 minutes at approx. 200° C, depending on the size of the peppers, the temperature of the kamado and the container in which they are cooked - simply check the cooking point of the rice in between. Once the rice is cooked, serve the peppers in the open pot so that they don't cool down too quickly.
Bon appétit, enjoy the delicious flavors!
