Preheat the oven to 200 degrees, turn on the grill. Grease a small baking dish (I use the flat lid of a small round glass dish for one pepper) with margarine. Cut the bell pepper in half lengthwise, remove the seeds and white separating membrane (you can leave the stem on for visual reasons, but you don’t have to).
Wash and dry the peppers.
Place in the buttered baking dish. For the filling, drain the tuna, put the drained fish pieces in a bowl and add the cream cheese. I usually use the herb and garlic flavored cheese, correspondingly less seasoning is needed. If you use natural cheese, you can squeeze another small clove of garlic into the bowl.
Clean the mushrooms with a damp cloth (drain the canned mushrooms) and cut them into fine pieces, add them to the bowl. Add Maggi and lemon juice and mix the ingredients well with a fork. It should be a pulpy mass.
Now fold in the Parmesan and season with oregano, basil, parsley and cayenne pepper and spices. Now fill the mixture evenly into the pod halves, stuffing nicely. The mixture should fill the pod well and only rise above the pod in a gentle mound, otherwise it may ‘run away’ when heated.
Sprinkle grated cheese over the filling, pressing down lightly and dusting the cheese cap with a little paprika powder. Broil the peppers for 10 minutes at 200 degrees on the middle rack, then reduce the temperature to 150 degrees and cook for another 5 minutes. Turn off the oven and let the peppers rest in the warm oven for 3 – 5 minutes. The bell pepper halves should still have bite at this point, but should be cooked. Grilling may cause the skin to brown slightly, if you don’t like it so dark, cover the halves with aluminum foil for the first 10 minutes and then let just the cheese get golden brown and crispy.
The mushrooms can be substituted or supplemented with other vegetables as desired. However, make sure that the vegetables are not too watery. With tomatoes, for example, remove the seeds and wobbly insides and use only the firm flesh.
A half to whole bell pepper can be enough as a side dish or appetizer for one person, to saturate as a main course, you can quietly calculate 1.5 – 2 pods per person, then salad or fish (eg grilled salmon) or baguette serve as a side dish.
