Bulgarian stuffed peppers with cheese and eggs - Chushki Bjurek

Lots of my memories are related to different smells – cinnamon of a cup of cappuccino sipped on a first date, the clear skin of a baby I kiss, freshly ground coffee, perfume of a friend. I perceive huge part of the world based on smells –every season, every month has a specific smell and the smell of late summer and early autumn is the smell of roasted peppers.  At least it was. During my childhood there were no air conditioners in Bulgaria and the only way to lower the harsh summer heat in the apartments was to keep all the windows wide open. And August and September were the months for home canning when part of all the abundance of vegetables available in this sunny country was put in small and larger jars for the winter months. Homemade is always better than anything you can buy. So this was the time for roasting peppers in large amounts. The distinctive smoky aroma of the roasted peppers went through the open kitchen windows, filled the streets and evoked memories and imagination.  

In today’s terms, everything prepared with roasted peppers shall be probably called slow food. Because although there are no refined ingredients in the dishes with roasted peppers, they are slow to prepare and require patience and a lot of devotion.

You can do so many things with roasted peppers… for instance Roasted peppers salad, Mish-mush with roasted peppers,  fried roasted peppers with tomato sauce or roasted peppers with charred eggplant dip (Kjopoolu), and of course - Chushki Bjurek .

Chushki Bjurek (hard to pronounce, easy to eat) is a vegetarian dish, which represents roasted red peppers filled and fried with a tasty mixture of crumbled Feta cheese and whisked eggs.

Ingredients:

•        8 red peppers
•       4 eggs
•       6 oz (180g) Feta cheese
•       1 garlic clove, minced
•       1 Tsp dry dill (optional)
•       Sunflower oil for frying
•        Salt to taste

For the batter:

•       2 eggs
•       6 Tbsp flour
•       6 Tbsp bread crumbs

Preparation:

Roast and stuff the peppers:

Wash peppers and roast on medium heat on top of the stove or on the grill. 

When one side of the pepper gets black, turn until all the sides get uniformly charred. 
Transfer peppers into a plastic bag and let cool for about 30 minutes until cool enough to handle.

Remove peels of the peppers, cut the upper 1/4-inch part (about 5-6 mm) and deseed. 
Strain any juice after peeling and sprinkle with some salt.

Break eggs in a bowl and beat with a fork until frothy. Crumble cheese, add to the eggs and stir in dill and minced garlic clove.

Spoon stuffing into each pepper, trying not to break their soft and tender skin.

Cover with batter and fry:

Take three plates and put the flour in one of them, the eggs for the batter in the second and the bread crumbs in the third. Beat eggs for the batter until frothy.

Put sunflower oil into a pan and turn heat to medium.

Roll every pepper in flour, dip into the eggs and then into the bread crumbs .

Put every pepper into the hot oil and fry for about 5 minutes on every side turning once.

Remove from the heat and serve hot with some spoons of yogurt.