Gemista
Gemista (or yemista) are traditional Greek stuffed vegetables. This ugly-delicious baked recipe makes a great veggie main course or side dish. Before you startRead the recipe carefully – you’re going to chop up one of the capsicums and hollow out the other three. You need to empty the tomatoes but keep their insides. Some of the potato is grated, the rest is chunked. You peel and grate one of the zucchini, you leave the rest unpeeled and slice. Just read the instructions carefully and you’ll be fine 😉The quantity suggested here serves from 3 to 12 people. Three people would be a generous main course, assuming a whole capsicum and a whole tomato each. Twelve people would be a side dish of half a tomato or capsicum each.
Equipment
- Baking dish, about 20 x30 cm. You want all the stuffed veg to sit in a single layer, but still be quite a snug fit. The capsicums can lie on their side if that works better.
Ingredients
- 4 red capsicums/bell peppers divided
- 3 large tomatoes
- 500 g zucchini approx. four small
- 500 g potatoes approx. 3 medium sized, divided
- salt
- Tablespoon dried mint
- large handful fresh parsley
- 30g tomato paste (2 tablespoons)
- 100 g ordinary long-grain rice (not basmati or jasmine) uncooked, no need to rinse
- Tablespoon lemon juice
- 180 g olive oil divided
- Tablespoon dried oregano
- 3 whole cloves
- lemon juice to serve
Instructions
- Preheat Oven - to 160°C
- Capsicums - put the ugliest capsicum (if they're not all beautiful!) aside (for chopping up later). Cut a small cap off the remaining three (the stem end) and keep these. Empty the inside carefully with a thin-edged spoon. You can discard these seeds and white membrane. Place the empty capsicums in the roasting pan.4 red capsicums/bell peppers
- Tomatoes - cut a small cap from all the tomatoes and reserve these. Scoop out the insides of the tomatoes with a spoon and tip out into a sieve set over a large bowl (don’t discard anything). You’ll use the seeds and flesh retained in the sieve, plus the tomato juice in the bowl underneath later. Place the empty tomatoes in the roasting pan.3 large tomatoes
- Zucchini & Reserved Capsicum - cut off a section of zucchini that is about a quarter of the total weight of zucchini. Peel and coarsely grate this into a large bowl (leave the rest of the zucchini unpeeled). Finely dice the ‘ugly’ capsicum from before and add this to the grated zucchini.500 g zucchini
- Fry Tomato Paste (optional) - heat a tablespoon of olive oil (taken from the rest) in a small frying pan. Add the tomato paste and cook, stirring often for a couple of minutes, until slightly thickened and darkened.30g tomato paste (2 tablespoons)
- Prepare Filling - peel all the potato. Cut a chunk that is about the size of an egg and coarsely grate this. Set the rest of the potatoes aside for later. Add the grated potato to the zucchini and capsicum bowl. Chop up the tomato pulp from the sieve and add this (along with any seeds). Add 2 teaspoons salt, freshly ground black pepper, mint, finely chopped parsley, the tomato paste, rice, lemon juice and HALF the olive oil (90ml/6 tablespoons, or a bit less if you already used some to fry the tomato paste in the previous optional step).500 g potatoessaltTablespoon dried mintlarge handful fresh parsley100 g ordinary long-grain rice (not basmati or jasmine)Tablespoon lemon juice180 g olive oil
- Stuff Vegetables - fill the tomatoes and capsicum with the rice mixture and top with their caps. Don’t press down or over-fill. You want to be able to place the lids back on without seeing the rice, which will swell as it cooks and absorbs liquid. Keep any rice that's left over.
- Zucchini & Potatoes - to the tomato juice, add the remaining olive oil, the oregano, 1 teaspoon salt and some freshly ground black pepper and combine. Cut the remaining zucchini (unpeeled) into 1 cm slices and add to the bowl. Cut the rest of the potatoes into 3-4cm chunks and add these. Mix together well.180 g olive oilTablespoon dried oreganosalt
- Add Chopped Vegetables - dot the zucchini and potatoes around the stuffed capsicums and tomatoes. Add any rice mixture that's left over. You want everything to be a fairly snug fit. Stick the cloves into three of the potatoes. Drizzle over any remaining liquid from the bowl.3 whole cloves
- Covered Bake – add about a cup (250ml/g) of water in the corner of the dish (not over the veg) so that it leaves a layer beneath the contents. Sprinkle the veg with more salt and pepper. Cover with foil and bake for about an hour, until the rice is cooked and the potatoes are soft.
- Uncovered Bake – uncover the dish and continue to bake for another 25-35 minutes, until the veg is sitting in a concentrated tomato sauce, not swimming in watery juices. We want them to brown slightly too.lemon juice
- Rest - remove the cloves from the potato before serving. Allow to rest for at least 20 minutes at room temperature before serving. Spritz with lemon juice.