Stuffed tomato recipes are ubiquitious around the world – North America, Latin America, South America and Asia all have varieties on this classic dish. Since I love Italy and Italian food, this iteration of this classic stuffed fruit has an Italian flavor. It was pointed out to me that “stuffed” and “wrapped” are different. However for my website and book I consider stuffed, filled or wrapped all included under the name of “wrapped”. This recipe will be found in the first volume of the book series.
Stuffed Tomatoes
Ingredients
Rice
- 1 cup Jasmine or basmati rice cooked and cooled
Tomatoes
- 4 Beefsteak tomatoes
Filling
- 1½ tsp EVOO
- 1 lb sweet Italian sausage, casing removed
- ½ cup Vidalia or sweet onion finely diced
- 2 garlic cloves minced
- ½ cup mozzarella cheese shredded
- ¼ cup Parmesan Reggiano cheese grated
- ¼ cup Italian parsley chopped
- ¼ tsp Kosher salt
- ¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
Assembly
- ¼ cup Parmesan Reggiano cheese grated.
- ⅓ cuo plain Panko breadcrumbs
- 1 ⅓ TBS salted butter, just melted.
- 2-3 TBS chives thinkly sliced, or parsley roughly chopped.
Instructions
Rice
- Using a rice cooker cook makes cooking the rice so much easier. Add the water and rice to the cooker as indicated on the package. Set aside to cool when done.
Tomatoes
- Carefully cut off the tomato tops and set aside.
- Scoop out the inside of the tomatoes and set aside.
Filling
- Add the EVOO to a saute pan over medium heat. When hot add the uncased sausage.
- Cook the sausage until browned, chopping into smaller pieces as you cook.
- Drain the oil and sausage fat, but save. Add `1 TBS back into the saute pan.
- Add the onions and cook until transparent.
- Add the garlic, do not let it burn, cook until fragrant.
- Mix in the rice, parsley, salt and pepper until well mixed.
- Mix the mozzarella and parmesan together, then add the cheeses to the rice mixture. Set aside.
Assembly
- Fill the tomatoes with the filling. Place them into a greased 9 x 9 inch baking pan, standing them upright.
- In a small bowl mix the parmesan cheese and the panko.
- Pour the melted buttter over the panko mixture and mix well.
- Place the cheese/panko mixture on top of each of the tomatoes.
- Bake at 350 degrees F for 15 to 20 minutes.
- 15 minutes into the baking, the panko topping should be browned. Then place the reserved tomato tops on top of the filled tomatoes.
- The tomato tops should be cooked, but not burned.
- Top with chives or parsley, and serve.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
