Stuffed Peppers

Well soccer practice got cancelled so I had plenty of time to make dinner tonight. Ive been waiting to use my Jennie O hot turkey sausage and decided I wanted to make something with the bell peppers I had in the fridge. I did my normal Allrecipes.com ingredient search and didn't really find anything so I went on JennieO.com and found a stuffed pepper recipe that I used as a guide. I was really excited because I have never made them before.

Ingredients
• Four Six bell peppers, any color or a combination
• 2 teaspoons garlic-infused or extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 package JENNIE-O TURKEY STORE® Sweet Lean Italian Turkey Sausage
• JENNIE O HOT Lean Italian Turkey Sausage
• 1 (15-ounce) can Italian-style or regular tomato sauce
• Tomato paste and can of crushed tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil or 2 teaspoons dried basil leaves 
• Frozen basil
• 1 (16-ounce) can great northern beans, drained and rinsed
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan or Asiago cheese
• 1/2 cup cooked brown rice
• http://jennieo.com/recipes/recipe_detail.aspx?Id=1174

Cut peppers lengthwise through stems keeping stem halves intact to hold stuffing. Discard seeds and veins. Cook in boiling salted water 5 to 6 minutes or until crisp-tender. Set aside.

 Remove the sausage from the casings and crumble in a skillet for about 5 minutes.  Add tomatoes, basil, and cooked brown rice and simmer.  Rinse and add beans and simmer for an additional 5 minutes.  I added tomato paste to thicken the mixture. I was quite proud of myself because I came up with the tomato paste idea all on my own.

 Before and after adding the tomato paste

Scoop the mixture into the peppers and sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Bake in the oven at 375 for about 20 minutes.