The bell pepper is a large, blocky, sweet Capsicum annuum with no heat at all, eaten raw or cooked worldwide. Green peppers are simply unripe; red, yellow and orange ones are ripe.
What it is¶
The bell pepper is a sweet, completely heatless variety of Capsicum annuum, the same species as the jalapeño and cayenne. The fruit is large (typically 7–12 cm), blocky and thick-walled, usually with three or four lobes at the base. Names vary: in Britain it is simply a pepper or sweet pepper, in Australia, New Zealand and India a capsicum, and in Hungary and much of central Europe paprika, which is why the ground spice has that name.
The lack of heat has a precise cause. Chilli plants need a working copy of a gene called Pun1 to make capsaicinoids in the placenta. Bell peppers carry two copies of a recessive, non-functional version, so the placenta makes none, and a bell pepper sits at a flat 0 on the scoville scale.
Colour is mostly a matter of ripeness. Every bell pepper starts green; left on the plant, it ripens to red, yellow or orange depending on variety (purple, white and chocolate-brown kinds exist too). Green peppers are cheaper because they are picked weeks earlier and the grower does not risk losing ripening fruit to rot or pests. Ripe peppers are sweeter and richer in carotenoids and vitamin C; gram for gram, a raw red pepper contains more vitamin C than an orange.
📌 Male and female peppers
A popular claim holds that four-lobed peppers are "female", sweeter and better raw, while three-lobed ones are "male" and better for cooking. It is a myth: pepper fruits are not sexed, and lobe number depends on variety and growing conditions.
Origins and history¶
Mild, fleshy forms of C. annuum were grown in the Americas, and they reached Europe with the hot chillies after Columbus's voyages (see the columbian exchange). Over the following centuries Spain, Italy, Hungary and the Balkans developed their own large, sweet pepper types for roasting, stuffing and stewing, and the heatless trait was bred into the peppers used for sweet paprika.
The modern blocky bell is largely a twentieth-century American product. The variety 'California Wonder', introduced in the 1920s, set the pattern of a big, square, thick-walled green pepper and remained a standard for decades. Later breeding added disease resistance and reliable colour, and the expansion of heated glasshouse growing in the Netherlands and elsewhere from the late twentieth century made red, yellow and orange peppers available all year in northern Europe.
Flavour and aroma¶
Green peppers taste grassy, crisp and slightly bitter. Their characteristic smell comes largely from 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, a compound humans can detect in tiny amounts and the same family of molecules behind the "green pepper" note in Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc wines. As the fruit ripens the pyrazine fades and sugars rise: red peppers are the sweetest and fruitiest, yellow and orange milder and more delicate.
Cooking changes them a good deal. Slow frying in olive oil makes them soft and jammy; charring over a flame adds smoke and caramel; long stewing, as in peperonata, turns them almost sweet-sour.
In the kitchen¶
Bell peppers are a vegetable first and a seasoning second, but in several cuisines they are part of the flavour base.
- Cajun and Creole cooking: diced green pepper, onion and celery form the "holy trinity" at the start of gumbo, jambalaya and étouffée. See cajun and creole cuisine.
- Mediterranean stews: Italian peperonata, French ratatouille, Basque piperade (seasoned with Espelette), Hungarian lecsó and Spanish pisto.
- Stuffed: Hungarian töltött paprika in tomato sauce, Greek gemista with rice and herbs, Turkish biber dolması. See greek cuisine.
- Roasted: skinned red peppers with olive oil, garlic and anchovies; blended into romesco-style sauces or into muhammara with walnuts and Aleppo pepper.
- Stir-fries: Chinese beef with green pepper in black bean sauce; sweet and sour dishes. See chinese cuisine.
- Raw: in Greek horiatiki salad, gazpacho, crudités and salsas.
💡 Roasting and peeling
Roast whole peppers at 220°C (gas 7) for 25–35 minutes, turning once, until the skins blister and blacken in patches, or char them directly over a gas flame. Seal in a bowl under a plate for 10 minutes, then slip off the skins and remove the seeds. Do not rinse them: the juices are the best part. Two large red peppers give roughly 200 g of roasted flesh.
Buying and storing¶
Choose peppers that are heavy for their size, glossy and firm, with green, fresh-looking stalks and no soft or wrinkled patches. Keep them unwashed in the fridge salad drawer: green peppers last up to two weeks, ripe ones about a week. Sliced raw peppers freeze well without blanching for cooking later, though they lose their crunch. Roasted, peeled peppers keep in the fridge for a few days, or for longer covered in oil and kept refrigerated; jarred roasted peppers are a good store-cupboard stand-by.
Substitutes¶
- Pointed Romano or ramiro peppers: thinner-skinned and sweeter; excellent roasted.
- Jarred roasted peppers or piquillo peppers, for anything roasted.
- For green pepper in cooked dishes, poblano or Anaheim (new mexico chile) bring the same grassy note with a little warmth.
- Banana pepper or cubanelle-type frying peppers for sweet, thin-walled peppers.
Pairs well with¶
Tomato, onion, garlic, olive oil, basil, oregano, thyme, paprika, cumin, anchovies, feta, eggs, sausages, chorizo, rice and aubergine.
Growing your own¶
Bell peppers are grown like chillies but are slower and a little fussier, because the large fruit takes a long time to ripen. Sow indoors in February–March at 20–25°C, grow on at 18°C or more, and in Britain keep them in a greenhouse, polytunnel or very sunny, sheltered patio after the last frost. Space plants about 45 cm apart and stake them, as a crop of heavy fruit can snap stems. Water evenly: irregular watering stops calcium reaching the developing fruit and causes blossom end rot, a sunken black patch at the base. Feed with a high-potash tomato fertiliser once flowering. Pick green when full-sized and glossy, or wait several more weeks for full colour; picking the first fruit green encourages the plant to set more. See growing chillies.