A healthy, vegan adaptable, Roasted Chiles Rellenos Recipe – that is lightened up with the addition of black beans. Simplified by roasting (instead of frying) the peppers with the Salsa Ranchero Sauce ingredients – all baked together on one sheet-pan – saving a step!
My husband Brian loves Chiles Rellenos. The problem is I love them too, but they don’t look quite as good on me. Typically they are battered and fried and often greasy and heavy, dripping with fat and calories. This Roasted Chiles Rellenos recipe calls for roasting, not frying, and the addition of cholesterol-lowering black beans.
I’ve even included a vegan version if you want to eliminate the dairy all together which surprisingly got a huge thumbs up from my husband as well. The nice thing is you can make some vegan, some with cheese and even “beef” some up with meat for heartier eaters. Keep in mind, this is NOT a traditional recipe by any means, but a healthier take on Chiles Rellenos. OK??? 😉
But what I love MOST about this recipe, is the sheet-pan roasting method, where the peppers are roasted, along with the Salsa Ranchero Sauce ingredients. It saves a huge step. So easy, and much quicker than traditional Chiles Rellenos while being much lighter and super delicious!
Healthier Chiles Rellenos! | 30-second video!
Once the chilies are roasted, slit them vertically and run under cool running water, removing the seeds with your fingers. Some of the peels will slip off, some will not and with poblanos, the peeling is so thin, I rarely fuss over it, leaving whatever wants to stay on, on.
PEPPERS: Get the biggest Poblano Chilies you can find. The peppers you see in the photos were abnormally large poblanos (like 8 inches long!). One pepper was one serving. If you only have smaller ones available, ( like 4-inch ones) get double the amount, you may need to serve 2 as a serving.
Poblanos (vs Pasilla peppers) are easiest to work with- they are sturdier! They will most likely take 30 minutes to roast while pasillas roast much quicker, so be sure to check pasillas after 10-15 minutes or they may get too soft to handle, and hard to stuff.
You can also blacken either of peppers on a gas grill or on a stovetop gas burner (easiest) rotating with tongs until charred on all sides, then wrap up in a paper bag, or foil for 8-10 minutes to allow them to steam and soften before seeding and peeling under cool running water.
I wanted to show you two products that come in handy at home- I try to keep in my pantry. Tomato Paste in a tube– because so rarely do we use the whole can, and the rest often goes to waste. And seasoned black beans- a faster way to add more flavor to meals- these have onion, garlic and green chilies in with them.
Here Poblanos are stuffed with a black bean and cheese mixture and placed over the ranchero sauce in an extra-large baking dish. These poblanos are HUGE by the way.
Here below is the vegan version in a mini cast iron skillet. My point being, you can bake them all together, or separately if you choose. This way it’s easy to adapt them for vegans and non-vegans.
This vegan version is made with a combination of black beans and herbed tofu ricotta – it’s really flavorful!
Or bake them all together in a large skillet. Keep them lean like you see below or add melty cheese to the top, up to you!
Even the bean and cheese stuffed chilies are relatively low in calories when made this way.
MEAT: If cooking for mixed households you can easily add browned, seasoned ground meat to some while keeping others vegan or vegetarian. If adding meat, this Mexican Turkey chorizo is nice, as well as cooked shredded Chicken Carnitas.
The Roasted Salsa Ranchero Sauce is really yummy and flavorful too- use it with enchiladas or Mexican Pizza or in this Enchilada Casserole!
A delicious and healthy Sunday Supper, full of great flavor without the added fat and calories! Give it a whirl and rate it below!
Have a beautiful fall weekend!
PrintRoasted Chiles Rellenos with Black beans
A healthy, vegan adaptable, Roasted Chiles Rellenos Recipe – that is lightened up with the addition of black beans. Simplified by roasting (instead of frying) the peppers with the Salsa Ranchero Sauce ingredients – all baked together on one sheet-pan – saving a step!
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 60
- Total Time: 1 hour 20 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Category: Main - GF & Vegan Adaptable
- Method: Roasted
- Cuisine: Mexican
Ingredients
- 4–6 extra-large poblano peppers, leave whole with stems on. (see notes)
- 6 ripe, medium tomatoes, ( roma, or vine-ripened)
- 6 fat garlic cloves
- one large onion, sliced into ½ inch wedges or slices
- 2 small jalapeños
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
FILLING:
- 14 ounce can black beans, drained and rinsed -seasoned (see notes) or Cuban Style are nice
- 6 ounces grated jack cheese or Mexican queso fresco (or 1 cup vegan Herbed Tofu Ricotta )
SAUCE ADDITIONS:
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 1 teaspoon coriander
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste (optional, but good)
- ¼ cup fresh cilantro plus more for garnish
- 1/4–1/2 cup water or broth ( to the desired consistency)
Serve with cilantro lime rice, sour cream, hot sauce, avocado, toasted pumpkin seeds, cilantro
Instructions
- READ DIRECTIONS ALL THE WAY THROUGH
- Preheat oven to 45oF
- ROAST Poblanos and Sauce ingredients: Cut the tomatoes in half and arrange them on the sheet pan. Add the sliced onions to sheet pan, along with the whole garlic cloves, halved jalapeños and whole poblano peppers, making sure they are not overcrowded. You may need to use two sheet pans. (You can also char the peppers on a gas burner, see notes) Drizzle all with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper and place on the middle rack and check after 15 minutes. (If your oven runs hot, you could turn it down to 425 if needed.) If the peppers are tender remove them (pasilla peppers will cook much faster than poblanos- please see notes) and check the garlic, removing it if tender. Otherwise continue roasting with the tomatoes and onions another 15-20 minutes, until peppers and onions are tender and tomatoes are juicy.
- In the meantime make the filling: Mix the canned beans (drained, rinsed) with the cheese. OR If going vegan, mix the beans with 1 cup of vegan herbed tofu ricotta. Season the mixture with salt and pepper. If using plain black beans, add a teaspoon of cumin and chili powder.
- When the poblanos are just tender, take the sheet pan out of the oven (leave the oven on) and let it cool.
- Add ⅓ of the onions, chopping them up, and add into the filling mixture and stir.
- Blend up the Roasted Ranchos Sauce: Place the remaining onions into a blender along with the tomatoes, pan juices, jalapeño, garlic, cumin, coriander, chili powder, oregano, salt, tomato paste and fresh cilantro, adding a little water (or broth if needed) to thin it out, and blend until smooth. Set aside.
- STUFF POBLANOS: Carefully cut a slit in the poblano peppers from stem to pointy end and using your fingers, gently remove seeds while rinsing them under cold running water. If the thin skins slip off, let them, but don’t worry about actively peeling them, especially poblanos – their skins are quite thin -leaving some of the skin on is perfectly fine. Pasillo peppers have thick skin and should be peeled. In a large greased baking dish (or oven-proof skillet) pour a little of the roasted tomato ranchero sauce to coat the bottom (use about half the sauce). Place the peppers over top of the sauce, slit side up, then spoon the black bean filling into each one. Pour the rest of the flavorful ranchero sauce over top. At this point, you could add more shredded cheese to the top, or leave it off.
- Cover with foil and bake 20-25 minutes in a 425F oven- or until the filling is warm and melty, uncover and bake 5 more minutes.
- Garnish with cilantro leaves, toasted pumpkin seeds and sour cream if you like.
Notes
If you have an electric oven, or your oven runs hot, lower heat to 425F
PEPPERS: Get the biggest Poblano Chilies you can find. The peppers you see in the photos were abnormally large poblanos (like 8 inches long!). One pepper was one serving. If you only have smaller ones available, ( like 4-inch ones) get double the amount, you may need to serve 2 as a serving.
Poblanos (vs Pasilla peppers) are easiest to work with- they are sturdier! They will most likely take 30 minutes to roast while pasillas roast much quicker, so be sure to check pasillas after 10-15 minutes or they may get too soft to handle, and hard to stuff.
You can also blacken either of peppers on a gas grill or on a stovetop gas burner (easiest) rotating with tongs until charred on all sides, then wrap up in a paper bag, or foil for 8-10 minutes to allow them to steam and soften before seeding and peeling under cool running water.
MEAT: If cooking for mixed households you can bake these individual baking dishes or even in mini cast iron skillets like you see here – which is especially nice if cooking for both vegans and meat-eaters. You can easily add browned, seasoned ground meat to some while keeping others vegan or vegetarian. If adding meat, this Mexican Turkey chorizo is nice, as well as cooked shredded Chicken Carnitas.
Keywords: chilies rellenos, healthy chilies rellenos, chilies rellenos recipe, vegan chilies rellenos, baked chilies rellenos, chilies rellenos healthy
Everyone loved it! I was apprehensive since Rellanos are traditionall battened and fried but these were delectable and packed with flavor, from all those roasted veggies. Made the rice too. Will definitely make again.
★★★★★
Thanks so much- Glad you enjoyed!
This is a superb recipe – our whole family loved it. Be sure to make the Cilantro Lime rice with it; they are a perfect combination. The only mistake I made was that I put too little sauce at the bottom of the baking dish and too much on top of the peppers. Next time I will get the ratio better so you can really see the gorgeous peppers when they come out of the oven. These make great leftover too — in fact, I think it may have been even better the next day when the stuffing inside the pepper firmed up and the sauce’s spices settled. Another winning recipe from Feasting at Home!
★★★★★
Awesome Lindsay- glad you liked it! 🙌
I haven’t made this yet, but I’ve been on a lot of your recipes recently. I made your Szechuan tofu (amazing!) and have been really excited to see how you cook for multiple styles of eater. My kids, husband, and I are all vegan, but our extended family is not. I’m looking forward to making this for our larger family gatherings to accommodate their meat/cheese eating preferences!
Let me know how it goes!
OMG! I just made the Chiles Rellenos! They are amazing! Making them was very easy and the flavor is phenomenal.
Awesome, thanks, great to hear! 🙌
My husband loves this recipe! It is excellent.
★★★★★
We made the vegan version of this and it was fantastic!! Thank you for such a wonderful recipe!! We will definitely make it again!!! The homemade ranchero sauce was fabulous and made the dish extra special.
★★★★★
Thanks so much and so happy you liked it! 👏
I have been craving this recipe for over a week now! Thank you so much for posting it! I’m in a home of incredibly picky eaters and for once I’m glad they won’t eat my cooking. More for me!
★★★★★
Haha! Perfect!
Me and my husband are trying to go meatless. This is the first recipe we tried. Whenever he voluntarily replies he likes it that makes my work worth all the effort. The Chile rellanos were delicious. We loved the sauce. I substituted the beans for a rice and mushroom mix. We will be making this again! Thank you for the recipe.
★★★★★
Great to hear- thanks Teri!
new to your site. Go girl. now Im a really good home cook was a friend of James ,Jimmy , Beard. bin cooking for 70 years ,,,you have amazed me as I read your recipes. these stuffed poblanos look great. mine are stuffed with mozzarella and skinny strips sorta close the slit like shoe laces served on a pool of red sauce flavored with oregano. den a splash of sauce on da toe ,,,I never slit all da way down so filling doesn’t get out and at the stem end slit from left to wright or rite ta left. ha ha ,,and cut seed attached area and carefully remove seed ball I like stem and top intact great for presentation ,,can also stuff wit a pulled pork shrimp or Lamb. Again go go girl James Beard woulda loved your stile I DO
★★★★★
You are so sweet Josheph- really appreciate this and you. Would loved to have met Jimmy. 🙂
I made this with a date, for a date night dinner in, and it was fantastic! We both absolutely loved it. Easy and fun to make together.
We added small frozen shrimp to the bean and cheese filling. And used Cotija cheese as well.
It was such a hit that we both made it again the following night.
★★★★★
This made too much sauce for my liking, so I still have a jar left. The sauce also ended up too thin, so I wouldn’t add the extra broth or water until after you’ve blended it to see the texture. Also, the sauce tasted weirdly sweet — I ended up adding some chipotles in adobo to balance that out. Not a bad recipe, but could use some improvements.
Sounds wonderful but I need to make something in advance and cook the next day. Will it still be as good?
I think so! Or you could make the Farmers Market Enchiladas?
I love this recipe. My husband and kids like theirs with the turkey chorizo and I have mine with the beans. Everybody Happy. Really helps to get the biggest peppers you can find. Less work!
★★★★★
What is the filling part made from? It just says spoon the filling into the peppers but it doesn’t state what the recipe for the filling is. Is it just black beans and cheese. I’m half way through making it so I’m going to have to ad lib. 🙁
Yes the black beans and cheese.
Sauce was pretty good but overall, a bit bland.
★★★
Sorry it wasn’t your cup of tea.
This recipe was a total hit in our house! Thank you so much for posting. I was a little confused about whether to cook the beans before filling the peppers (the recipe seemed to imply use uncooked beans?), but we did cook on the stovetop with garlic and salt and onion for a little while before adding the cheese to make the filling. YUM YUM YUM. My husband says “top 5” recipes we’ve made.
★★★★★
Glad you liked it. Use canned, cooked beans. 🙂
Thanks! In retrospect, that makes perfect sense. In any event, the recipe was great.
★★★★★
Great instructions
★★★★★
Amazing recipe for vegetarians; the sauce is delicious. We were dipping chips in it like salsa, and we even froze the leftover sauce we had and used it to marinade chicken almost 2 months later. Once the ingredients are washed and prepped, it’s a simple throw together, fun for family to prep together. Thank you so much, this definitely made our permanent cookbook.
★★★★★
So I married this sauce recipe with your enchilada recipe (because grocery store ran out of poblanos), and it was amazing! I could actually eat the sauce from a bowl – so yummy! Thanks and keep posting!
★★★★★
Sounds perfect- love your adapting!
hi! do you remove the tomato peel after roasting? thanks!
I usually don’t remove them, no.