On all my favourite cooking shows the hosts always say you can just put red peppers under the broiler to make roasted red bell peppers. Then they proceed to use a gas burner instead. I do not have a gas burner so I was always dubious about how easy these were to make in the oven. I got a small bag of red peppers for $1.50 (what a deal!) and wanted to try oven-roasting them.
I turned on the broiler, let it heat up and then put the peppers two inches away from the element. I was surprised that it took a while but they did start to blacken over time. I turned them over to expose the other side of the flesh. Whatever you do, do not use parchment paper when you do this process, it will go up in flames!
After about 10 minutes my peppers had blackened here and there and were ready to be put into a brown paper bag. I left them in there for at least ten minutes.
Beautiful! I took off the tops, removed the seeds and did not run them under water, this will dilute their flavour. Definitely a little more time consuming than using a gas burner but not hard at all, in fact, impressively easy to make. There is so much you can do with these peppers: soups, dips, pasta sauces… I am going to try everything!
After I made these life got insanely busy and I did not want them to go to waste so I put them in freezer bags for a red bell pepper soup!
You can also grill the peppers to a wonderful charred state to get the same amazing flavour. They are so versatile too, I bet you would love them on your Phat Philly Pizza with the grilled chicken, the flavours compliment quite nicely.
I just made some of these this weekend! It was my first attempt, and it went much easier than I thought. The recipe I went by said to put the finished peppers in olive oil and store them in the fridge, so I guess you can use the flavored oil, too!