Greek Cypriot Stuffed Vegetables
Home » COOK »It’s been a long time since I shared any Greek Cypriot Recipes on my blog, so today I’ve got a family recipe for Greek Cypriot Stuffed Vegetables.
You can use various vegetables of your choice – peppers, and tomatoes are two of the popular ones, but you can also stuff courgette/zucchini, aubergine, marrow, potatoes, and onions. I use a mixture of pork and/or beef mince, rice, herbs, and spices to stuff the vegetables with.
Greek Cypriot Stuffed Vegetables
I find that Greek-Cypriot recipes are made differently depending on who you speak to. So you could use a mixture of beef and pork mince, or just pork. Or you could stuff the vegetables with a rice and vegetable mix, or use a different combination of herbs and spices… that’s why I always find it a bit tricky to write out my Greek-Cypriot recipes, because they may be very different to another recipe for the exact same dish. In fact, I just call this dish stuffed peppers – even though it contains other vegetables. In Greek, it is called Dhiafora Parayiemista, which translates to various stuffed vegetables
Ultimately, I share what I have had passed down to me from my grandmother, aunts, or from my dad, which is the Cypriot half of me. (The other, for those interested, is Lithuanian.)
Since I’ve not made stuffed peppers for a while, I had to phone my dad to be reminded of the recipe. I know that the stuffing mixture is quite similar to Dolmades/Koupepia (stuffed vine leaves), but I wanted to make sure I had it all correct.
The basic mixture, he said is mince (beef or pork, whatever you have), onions, rice, fresh flat leaf parsley, salt and pepper. Sometimes he’ll put some dried oregano in it. He also said, he chops more vegetables these days to go inside – like mushrooms, and extra peppers, as my mum prefers it that way. I personally put lemon juice, mint and a bit of cinnamon in mine – all about personal preference!! He reminded me that his aunty said he should cook off the onions for a bit first, before mixing with the other ingredients – because it adds more flavour. But then he told me that he now cooks the meat off too. Us Cypriots… we don’t make things easy to we?!
In the past, I would normally stuff the vegetables with the raw mixture and cook in the oven. For this recipe, I combined the knowledge from my great-aunt, dad, and my own twist. But, for the record, you just mix all the raw stuffing ingredients together, before filling the vegetables. This way you can prep in advance, and leave in the fridge until you are ready to cook.
To start with I hollowed out the vegetables – a couple of beefsteak tomatoes, 2 peppers, and 2 courgettes. I flavoured the mince meat after it was cooked off, so that I could check for flavourings, and then stuffed the vegetables.
I found I had some of the stuffing leftover, so I then stuffed the last couple of small potatoes I had in the house (we were waiting on our grocery delivery!) and stuffed some onion shells too, to use it up.
I then added some stock around the vegetables, and poured a little of it inside them too, before popping on the lids. I sprayed everything with a low calorie cooking spray instead of olive oil, so that I could make this recipe Slimming World friendly -ordinarily I would use olive oil.
The dish went into the oven for a good hour and a half, possibly even 2 hours. So many Cypriot dishes are a labour of love! Serve with a Greek salad, and some dips like hummus, tahini, and/or tzatziki.
Greek Cypriot Stuffed Vegetables
Ingredients
- 2 bell peppers red, green, orange, or yellow
- 2 zucchini (courgettes)
- 2 beefsteak tomatoes
- 2 small potatoes
- 1 medium onion
For the Stuffing
- Olive oil
- 1 medium onion finely chopped
- 1.1 lbs ground pork and/or ground beef 5% fat
- 2 tsp dried mint
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 2 tsp dried parsley or a handful of fresh flatleaf parsley, chopped
- 2 Tbsp lemon juice
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ cup dry white rice uncooked
For the Cooking Liquor
- 1 beef or vegetable stock cube
- 2 cups boiling hot water
- 1 Tbsp tomato paste (tomato puree)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400°F/200°C/Gas 6 and prepare the vegetables for stuffing as described in the next steps.
- Bell Peppers: Slice off the “lid” and set it aside. Remove the seeds and membrane and discard them.
- Beefsteak Tomatoes: Slice a “lid” and set it aside. Scoop out the flesh, roughly chop, and place into a small bowl.
- Zucchini: Slice a tiny sliver from the bottom so the zucchini can sit without falling over. Slice a “lid” off lengthways. Scoop out the flesh with a teaspoon. Chop the flesh and add to the bowl of chopped tomatoes.
- Potatoes: Peel and slice a sliver from the bottom so that they can sit without falling over. Slice off a “lid.” Using a knife and teaspoon, scoop out some of each potato to make a hollow for the stuffing to sit. Discard this inner potato, as it’s not needed.
- Onions: Top and tail, then peel off the skin. Cut a slit from top to bottom a few layers in, and place in a bowl of boiling hot water for about a minute. Remove, and you can easily pull off the layers, keeping them intact.
- Brush a large roasting dish with olive oil. Stand all the vegetables inside the dish and set it aside.
- To make the stuffing, drizzle some olive oil into a frying pan. Add the chopped onion and sweat for 2-3 minutes. Then add the reserved tomato and zucchini flesh from the vegetable preparation above.
- Add the ground meat and cook for 6-8 minutes until browned.
- Remove pan from the heat. Add the dried mint, ground cinnamon, parsley, lemon juice, and salt. Mix well. Taste for seasoning—add more herbs and spices if you wish.
- Stir in the dry white rice and mix well.
- Distribute the filling among the various vegetables. For the onions, place some of the filling into one-half of the “shells” and wrap it around. (You could secure with a cocktail stick, but I never do.)
- For the cooking liquor, crumble a stock cube into the hot water and stir in the tomato paste. Pour some of this mixture into each stuffed vegetable and pour the remaining liquid around them. Place the "lids" back onto each vegetable. Drizzle the top with some more olive oil
- Cover the tray with aluminum foil, and place in the oven to cook for 1½ to 2 hours—remove the foil for the last 20-30 minutes of cooking time to brown.
- Serve Greek Cypriot Stuffed Vegetables hot with a Greek salad and dips. This dish can also be served cold or room-temperature.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is always approximate and will depend on the quality of ingredients used and serving sizes. If you need exact calories and macros, please do your own calculations.
Nayna Kanabar
January 20, 2017 @ 10:16 am
This is one tasty dish and I love the addition of cinnamon. This would be great served with some sauteed potatoes and salad.
Sarah Ebner
January 20, 2017 @ 9:51 am
This is exactly the kind of thing we like – perfect for supper and not too tricky either!