A Great Thanksgiving Appetizer Recipe by Burning Peppers? How?

A great Thanksgiving appetizer recipe can be the start of any reason to celebrate. Whether a holiday dinner, birthday, or weekend party, offering attractive and delicious yet simple appetizers can get any gathering off to a great start.

Appetizers, or “hors d Oeuvres” are small bites of food to stimulate the eye and palate. “Hors d’ Oeuvres” in French means “outside the meal”. These appetizers were originally prepared by the wait staff in early banquets, using the leftovers and scraps from the meal to be served. While the chefs were working, the waiters were offering tastes “outside the meal”.

One of my favorite small bites outside the meal can also be a simple Thanksgiving appetizer recipe. These Roasted Red Pepper Pinwheels involve making a soft cheese filling to line a roasted, skinned and filleted bell pepper.

Roasting red, yellow and orange bell peppers is a simple procedure, but it’s necessary that you use direct, conductive heat. In other words, you need a flame. A gas burner atop your stove is preferred, but a barbeque grill or even electric broiler will work. An oven supplies indirect, convective heat and won’t accomplish the charred skin we desire.

To make this Thanksgiving appetizer recipe a success, the peppers must be completely charred black. Any skin on the pepper that is not completely burned to a black color will not come off when the pepper is shocked in cold water.

You’ll be amazed at how tough the skin of a pepper is. The outside is burned beyond recognition, but behind that is a bright, colorful, soft fruit. The dramatic change in temperature causes all the burned skin of the pepper to rub right off.

To create a filet of roasted bell pepper, cut a slice along the length of the pepper from stem to blossom, keeping your knife behind the flesh but in front of the white pith cage that holds the seeds in place. When you have done it correctly, you will have left the cage and seeds behind, revealing a flat filet of flesh.

Now, any type of soft spread able cheese and your favorite herbs can be mixed and spread on the pepper filet. I prefer goat cheese, thyme, oregano, basil, salt, and white pepper. Your hands are the best tool for this job, so you can create an even depth of ¼ inch of cheese on top of the roasted pepper.

When you roll the pepper over on top of the cheese, creating a spiral design within, you’ll begin to realize why this is such a great Thanksgiving appetizer recipe. It’s simple, you can use the ingredients you desire, and it involves your own creativity along with a basic cooking method. Those are the best recipes of all, the ones you create yourself.

The stuffed rolled pepper should be wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerated for 2 hours, allowing the cheese to solidify. Once removed from the cooler and unwrapped, eighth-inch slices cut along the pepper’s latitude will reveal the contrast of the colorful pepper and white cheese in a spiraling pinwheel design.

The Red Pepper Pinwheels can be placed on crackers; artisan toasts, or used to top a pizza or broiled bruschetta. I think it’s a fantastic Thanksgiving appetizer recipe, but you can use it any time of the year you’d like.