Healthy Pepper Side Dish Recipes

Find healthy, delicious pepper side dish recipes including roasted pepper, stuffed pepper and bell pepper recipes. Healthier recipes, from the food and nutrition experts at EatingWell.

Staff Picks

Colorful Roasted Sheet-Pan Vegetables

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These easy sheet-pan roasted vegetables will give your plate a pop of color.
By Katie Webster

Cornbread-Topped Corn Casserole

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This sweet cornbread-topped corn casserole with spicy pepper Jack and smoky poblano peppers is sure to become your new favorite side dish! The natural sweetness of the corn is balanced by a dash of hot sauce, which adds pep and acidity that brings everything together.
By Marianne Williams

Roasted Butternut Squash Salad

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This roasted butternut squash salad is a mix of texture and flavor. Pepitas add crunch while honey and dried cherries provide a sweet-tart flavor.
By Haydn Shaak

Roasted Peppers & Onions

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Roasted peppers and onions complement just about everything; from grilled and roasted meats to seafood. This easy low-carb side dish, with its vibrant color and simple flavor, is sure to become a staple.
By Liv Dansky

Sautéed Peppers & Onions

This simple technique of cooking onions and peppers is a useful way to get your veggie servings in. They're quite versatile--use these peppers and onions on a burger or sausage sandwich, stuff them into quesadillas or layer them into casseroles.
By Katie Webster

Sheet-Pan Ratatouille

Ratatouille is a type of veggie-forward, Provençal-style stew. Our sheet-pan ratatouille features tangy goat cheese and sweet balsamic glaze that complement the tender charred vegetables. Bake the tomatoes on a separate pan so that the steam from the tomatoes won't steam the other vegetables.
By Cooking Light

Quick & Easy Pickled Cabbage

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This sweet-and-salty quick pickled cabbage is great to have on hand for a topping for sandwiches, hot dogs or brats. Both green and red cabbage work well and maintain their crunch after marinating in the pickling liquid that imparts a subtle, spicy flavor thanks to chile peppers.
By Karen Rankin

Creamy Corn Casserole with Lime, Chiles & Cilantro

If you like the Mexican corn dish known as esquites, you'll love this creamy corn casserole. Sweet corn and tangy lime brighten up this easy casserole, while serrano chiles and cotija cheese add spice and a salty note to keep everything balanced.
By Liv Dansky

Sautéed Peppers, Asparagus, and Zucchini

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Pair this flavorful veggie combo with chicken or fish for a taste of summer any time of year.
By Diabetic Living Magazine

Roasted Cauliflower with Banana Peppers

Don't be tempted to jam all the cauliflower onto one sheet pan in order to make fewer dirty dishes. Spreading it out on two pans ensures that it gets golden brown.
By Fabio Viviani

French Ratatouille

Ratatouille, a classic French dish with tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, bell pepper and onion, is frequently cooked low and slow until it turns silky and luscious. We kept the classic flavor but gave it a makeover by thinly slicing the vegetables and layering them in a cast-iron pan. We brighten up the flavor at the end with a splash of red-wine vinegar.
By Hilary Meyer

Roasted Red Peppers Stuffed with Kale & Rice

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You can vary the filling by substituting robust mustard greens or collards, or milder greens, such as spinach, escarole or Swiss chard. (Cook the greens until just tender in Step 2.)
By Marie Simmons
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Inspiration and Ideas

Stir-Fried Carrots, Corn & Peppers
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This eclectic stir-fry is a colorful combination of carrot, red bell pepper, corn and romaine lettuce. This recipe exemplifies how to stir-fry vegetables with different textures. The carrots, which are a “hard vegetable,” should be stir-fried for a minute before adding “medium-hard” vegetables like peppers or corn, which require slightly less cooking. Finally, add “soft or leafy vegetables” in the last 30 seconds to ensure all the vegetables achieve the same level of doneness. Make sure the lettuce is dry--if it's wet when added to the pan, it will turn the stir-fry into a braise.
Jardiniere
Is your garden booming? Making quick pickles is a low-pressure way to use up your bounty. Mix and match the vegetables as you see fit; just try to maintain a variety of textures and colors. Tip: After you finish a jar, use the leftover brine to make vinaigrette.
Jalapeño Creamed Corn
Mexican Cauliflower Rice
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Restaurant-style Mexican rice (sometimes called Spanish rice) gets a healthy, low-carb makeover in this recipe that swaps white rice for riced cauliflower. Cooked with other flavorful ingredients like tomatoes, jalapeño and cilantro, this makes the perfect, festive side for taco night.

All Healthy Pepper Side Dish Recipes

Sesame Snap Peas with Carrots & Peppers

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The colorful combination of sugar snap peas, red bell pepper and carrot plus Asian-inspired flavors make this side dish a pleasure to whip up for a weeknight dinner.
By EatingWell Test Kitchen

Steamed Cabbage & Carrots

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It's been said that serving cabbage for New Year's promises prosperity, so adding a few carrot coins can only sweeten the purse.
By Diabetic Living Magazine

Grilled Cauliflower with Feta

The tiny bits of red bell pepper add a nice sweet crunch to these grilled cauliflower wedges with a feta cheese and olive oil drizzle. Keeping the core of the cauliflower intact helps the wedges stay sturdy while grilling.
By Karen Rankin

Honey-Chipotle Roasted Broccoli

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Honey and chipotle peppers coat roasted broccoli in this sweet and smoky side dish. Serve alongside grilled pork, roasted chicken or with any main dish that could use some kick.
By Carolyn Casner

Escalivada (Smoky Slow-Roasted Vegetables)

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This vegan side dish is traditionally served at room temperature with grilled meat or fish, but feel free to double your portion and eat it as a vegan entree with crusty bread for dipping in that garlicky, flavor-packed olive oil. The name for this combination of roasted vegetables comes from the Catalan escalivar, meaning to cook in ashes, though most folks these days use an oven or grill to put some char on their veggies.
By Emily Monaco

Summer Grilled Vegetables

Colorful grilled summer vegetables are served with a light and refreshing sauce in this easy side dish that pairs perfectly with just about everything.
By Jasmine Smith

Skillet Zucchini & Summer Squash

Choose this easy squash recipe in late summer when your garden is overflowing with zucchini and summer squash. Green chiles add a bit of zing to this colorful side dish that can be served alongside chicken, fish, pork, or beef.
By Diabetic Living Magazine

Instant-Pot Vegan Black-Eyed Peas

The Instant Pot makes quick work of cooking up these vegan black-eyed peas. Fresh and dried spices and onion lend rich flavor to this simple bean dish.
By Karen Rankin

Blistered Broccoli with Garlic and Chiles

This quick-and-easy broccoli recipe goes well with any protein you're serving and is ready in just 30 minutes. It's charred quickly in a hot skillet and tossed with a lemony hot pepper-garlic mixture.
By Diabetic Living Magazine

Caraili (Sautéed Bitter Melon)

If you like radicchio, broccoli rabe or other bitter vegetables, you'll find caraili appealing as well.
By Ramin Ganeshram

Grilled Peppers & Onions

Grilled peppers and onions sweeten up and are perfectly tender off the grill. A simple red-wine vinaigrette drizzled over the top helps to brighten up the dish and enhance the flavors.
By Jasmine Smith

Calabacitas de Tapachula (Zucchini & Corn in Poblano Sauce)

Mexicans prepare the trio of corn, zucchini and poblanos in every possible way, from soups and stews to quick sides like this one from the city of Tapachula in Chiapas. In this recipe, adapted from Treasures of the Mexican Table by Pati Jinich, a mixture of zucchini and corn is enveloped in a creamy poblano sauce. Think of it as a Mexican version of ratatouille, but with more texture and much quicker to make. Be careful not to overcook the zucchini, and keep the corn crunchy.
By Pati Jinich

Cauliflower with Peppadew Peppers & Raisins

We sauté the cauliflower to get it slightly caramelized, then steam it to soften the vegetable without burning the spices.
By Julia Levy

Bell Pepper Oven Fries

These crispy bell pepper oven fries are a great way to add more colorful veggies to your plate. A crispy breaded coating adds crunch on the outside, while keeping the peppers tender inside. The simple creamy dipping sauce with Greek yogurt and sherry vinegar adds a tart and tangy finish.
By Carolyn Casner

Baigan Chokha (Roasted Spiced Eggplant)

Baigan chokha, a roasted spiced eggplant dish, features roasted eggplant that is then mashed to create a smooth texture.
By Ramin Ganeshram

Spicy Eggplant & Shishitos

Ben Bebenroth, chef and owner of Cleveland's farm-to-table Spice Catering, likes to make this sauté with Ichiban eggplant, which is a long, slender variety with thin skin that he grows on his farm.
By Ben Bebenroth

Grilled Sweet Potato Slices

Grilled sweet potato slices are paired with a spicy, creamy sauce with a hint of smoke. Serve this easy grilled side dish alongside grilled chicken, steak or veggie burgers. (The sweet potato slices are also delicious without sauce or with store-bought condiments like chipotle mayo.)
By Karen Rankin

Strawberry & Bean Sprout Salad with Spiced Potatoes

This combo may seem wild, but trust us--it works. Indian-American chef and cookbook author Raghavan Iyer developed it to have everything he thinks a perfect recipe should: a balance of heat, sweetness, a little pucker and a hit of salt combined with a tango of textures.
By Raghavan Iyer

Roasted Carrots & Mushrooms with Scallion Salsa Verde

Charred ginger and jalapeño amp up the flavor of this salsa verde by adding smokiness, a perfect match for the bright herbs and roasted vegetables. James Beard Award-winning Seattle chef Edouardo Jordan shared this recipe with EatingWell for our regular column "The Chef's Salad."
By Edouardo Jordan

Air-Fryer Hash Browns

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Air-fryer hash-brown potatoes will forever change how you cook hash browns. With less mess and a crispier crust, these air-fryer hash browns are sure to become a breakfast staple. The cheese not only helps the potatoes bind together, but it also adds a boost of flavor to each bite.
By Devon O'Brien
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