Stuffed Pepper Soup

This easy stuffed pepper soup tastes just like your favorite stuffed peppers, but with way less work. You’ll love this hearty and filling meal.

Why it Works

• This hearty soup has all the classic flavors of stuffed bell peppers. Sweet peppers, ground beef, rice, and yummy tomato sauce. But in soup form! It’s freezer-friendly and great for meal prep.
• The combination of lean beef and Italian sausage makes this soup rich, meaty, and flavorful without adding too much grease.
• A whopping 4 bell peppers are included to ensure that you get pepper in every bite, just like with stuffed peppers.
• The rice is kept separate to keep it from getting mushy and expanding in the soup.

About

Stuffed peppers always make me think of my Aunt Shirley. She had a big family, and she loved feeding them. Every year, she would make huge batches of stuffed peppers with produce from our shared garden and freeze them to enjoy during fall and winter.

Stuffing peppers is a labor of love and can be time consuming. Stuffed pepper soup is much easier to make.

My family loves this soup. It’s packed with protein and veggies, cooks quickly, is comforting, and delicious.

My kids love it too; admittedly, they do pick out some of the pepper chunks. They love everything else, and the peppers are easy for picky eaters to remove (more for mama!). The rice makes this very kid-friendly. But I often enjoy a bowl without rice and cheese for a lighter option.

Testing, Ingredients, and Nutrition Highlights

Testing Process

The concept is simple: stuffed pepper, but in soup form. It’s healthy, hearty, filling, delicious, and way quicker than preparing stuffed peppers. What’s not to love?

Getting the flavors perfect took some time for this one. I wanted to nail that classic stuffed pepper flavor, which eliminated a lot of my go-to ingredient options for flavor development.

I wrote down the recipe from an idea in my head and originally drafted it with 4 bell peppers. When I tested it the first time, I looked down at those peppers and thought, that’s way too many. So I initially tested with 2. It was good, but my husband and I looked at each other and said, yeah it needs more peppers. To bring home that classic stuffed pepper flavor, you need all 4 peppers.

I really wanted to be happy with only using lean ground beef to keep the soup simple and lean, but it’s just so much more flavorful to mix in Italian sausage.

I’ve also tried cooking the rice directly in the soup. The rice gets soggy and thick. It turns the leftovers into a bowl of mush. So, it’s better to steam a pot of white rice on the side and add it to the individual bowls when serving.

This one took 5 tries, but I perfected it, and I’m excited for you to add it to your dinner rotation.

Ingredients

• I recommend 93-10 lean ground beef. Since we’re pairing it with ground Italian sausage, using lean beef keeps the soup from getting too greasy.
• Ground Italian Sausage adds a ton of flavor to this soup. I tried adjusting the recipe several times to leave out the sausage, but the flavor was always lacking without it. It’s absolutely worth using both kinds of meat. You can use sweet or hot Italian sausage in this recipe.
• Garlic and Onion add flavor to help develop the broth.
• Large green bell peppers are what bring home the stuffed pepper vibes.
• You can use red, yellow, or orange peppers if you prefer. And, yes, you really do need 4 peppers.
• A flavorful spice mixture, including paprika, salt, pepper, garlic powder, red pepper flakes, and cayenne, seasons the soup.
• Two cans of crushed tomatoes add a robust flavor and acidity to brighten up all the flavors we’ve got going on. It also helps channel the tomato sauce component of classic stuffed peppers.
• Beef Better than Bullion and water give us the liquid to turn this into soup. You can substitute beef stock if you don’t have better than bullion.
• Fresh parsley adds a fresh, herby flavor that balances the soup.
• Freshly grated Parmesan cheese adds a rich umami flavor to the soup and a silky mouthfeel to the broth.
• White rice is cooked separately and added to the bowl during serving. This keeps it from getting mushy.
• Top it with Monterey Jack cheese to complete the meal. Pepper Jack or sharp cheddar cheeses also taste great.

Substitutions

Cauliflower Rice: For a lower-carb option that adds more veggies, substitute the rice for cauliflower rice.  Make it yourself or buy a frozen bag to steam.

Nutrition Highlights

1 ½ cup serving of soup with ½ cup of cooked rice and about 3 ½ tablespoons of shredded cheese is approximately 594 calories with 33 grams of protein and 6 grams of fiber. About 30% of the daily iron requirement, and is a good source of various vitamins, minerals, and easy to digest carbohydrates.

As with most soups, this is not appropriate for a low-sodium diet.

How to Make it

You’ll need a 5.5-quart enameled Dutch oven or stockpot, a microplane, and a box grater.

Prep the Vegetables

Peel and dice the onions. De-seed and cut the peppers into chunks. Mince the garlic.

Make the Soup

Heat a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Once it’s hot, add the ground beef, Italian sausage, and onions. Cook the mixture until the meat starts to brown and the liquid is mostly gone. Then, add the peppers and garlic and cook for about 2 minutes.

Stir in the spices, vinegar, and Worcestershire. Then, add the tomatoes, Better Than Bullion, and water.

Bring it to a boil over high heat, stirring frequently. Once it reaches a boil, reduce the heat to medium-low and stir it well, scraping the bottom of the pot to prevent sticking. Then, partially cover the pot and simmer for 30-minutes.

Meanwhile, Prepare the Rice

Prepare the rice while the soup is simmering. Add the rice to a pot and fill it with cool water. Then, stir to agitate the rice. Strain it into a fine-mesh strainer and rinse it with cool running water.

Return the rinsed and drained rice to the pot and add 3 cups of water.

Heat the rice over high heat, without stirring, until it reaches a boil.

As soon as it reaches a boil, turn the heat to the lowest setting and cover the pot with a tight-fitting lid. Cook on low for 15 minutes without stirring. Then, turn off the heat, leave the lid on, and let it sit, undisturbed, for 10 minutes.

Finish the Soup

When the soup is done simmering, remove the lid and stir in the freshly grated Parmesan. Then, stir in the chopped parsley.

Remove the lid from the rice and fluff it with a fork or a wooden spoon.

Serve the soup with rice, shredded Monterey Jack cheese, and parsley to garnish. If you like it spicy, try it with hot sauce.

How to Store, Reheat, and Freeze

Store & Reheat

Allow the leftovers to cool, then refrigerate in a covered container for 3-5 days.

Reheat leftovers on the stovetop or in a microwave-safe bowl.

Freeze

Cool the soup, then ladle it into freezer-safe containers, leaving 1 inch of head space. Or, vacuum seal it in bags. Use the wet-ingredient function on your vacuum sealer and press seal before the soup reaches the top.

Label and seal the container and freeze for up to 3 months.

Thaw in the fridge overnight or defrost in the microwave. Follow the reheating instructions above.

Serving Tips

• This stuffed pepper soup is a perfect comfort food in fall or winter. It’s a complete meal and perfect for supper.
• You can make this in late summer to preserve bell peppers from your garden or farmers market. Follow the instructions for freezing, and you can enjoy it during the fall.
• It’s also great for meal prep. I like to make a big batch to enjoy throughout the week.

Complete the Meal

This soup is a complete meal. If you want to add something extra, try serving it with crusty bread or Cheddar Bay Biscuits. You can also serve a green salad as a first course. My Simple Arugula Salad or Cranberry Walnut Salad would be perfect.

Recipe

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