Easy-to-Make Roasted Red Bell Peppers

With a little bit of practice, roasting and preserving red peppers becomes a no-brainer to make. The instructions are more complicated to write than to do. Submitted by online customer Anthony Bellov.

Ingredients:
unblemished ripe red bell peppers (or any color)
fresh crushed, skinned garlic cloves (approximately one clove to each two peppers)
Olinda Ridge Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Preparation:
Wash bell peppers and place them in a non-stick pan or roasting dish. Preheat oven to broil (high temp). Slide pan or dish with peppers into broiler. It's best if all the peppers to be roasted together have the same number of sides (meaning three, four or five-sided peppers). This makes things simpler when rotating peppers later.

Allow the skin facing the heat source to char black. Be careful to avoid over-broiling the flesh underneath. Once the skin blackens sufficiently (about two to three minutes), use tongs to turn all the peppers in the same direction. Once all the sides are blackened, try to stand the peppers on each end so ultimately, as much skin as possible is blackened with as little searing to the flesh underneath as possible. Peppers will split and crack. This is OK. When peppers are mostly blackened (there should still be some red to the wrinkled skin in folds and hidden surfaces) remove, place in a bowl and allow them to cool sufficiently to handle.

While peppers are roasting, take whole garlic cloves and remove the stub end. Crush garlic with the flat of a chef's knife. The skins should slide right off

Once peppers are cooled, remove stems. The seed cores will come out with the stem if you do it right. Peel the peppers into strips (they will "show you" how they want to peel) and remove charred skins by slipping your thumb between the skin and the flesh. Make certain all the skin is off. Remove any remaining pepper seeds as well. Keep a finger bowl or towel handy to clean your hands from time to time as they will get juicy and sticky. Pepper strips may be rinsed if absolutely necessary, but keep water to a minimum as it dilutes the flavor.

Place peppers into a glass storage unit with a seal or lid that closes tightly. A narrow container is better than a wide one in order to keep the exposed top area to a minimum. Layer peppers and add crushed garlic cloves periodically. Discard juices left in bottom of bowl. When the container is full or you've layered all your peppers, pour Olinda Ridge extra virgin olive oil on top to form a seal. Make certain no peppers or garlic protrude above the olive oil.

Keep refrigerated. Olive oil will congeal when cold. When serving peppers, allow the oil to clarify a bit before removing peppers from container. Add extra olive oil as needed while in storage. Make certain contents are always covered completely with oil. If stored properly, peppers should last for several months.