Sweet Peppers

Pepper Colors

GREEN peppers, bells and hot peppers (such as jalapeños) in the store  are immature or unripe. All peppers, if left on the vine until they ripen, will turn red, orange, yellow, purple or a chocolate color. This makes them sweeter and more expensive since they have to wait longer before picking.

There are several peppers that start out cream or white or purple and turn red or orange when mature. This color cobination is stunning when mixed with flowers.

Different Types of Sweet Peppers

Bell Peppers These are the blocky, squarish peppers that we know and love and grew up with. They are good for stuffing and eating raw in salad. Purple Beauty, and California Wonder are good examples. This year I have plenty of Mini Bells, (red, yellow, orange and chocolate) similar to what you get in a bag of mixed colors from the grocery store.

Other Peppers, sometimes called non-bell heirloom and hybrid peppers, stuffing peppers, banana peppers, etc. Most of them are open-pollinated heirlooms. Corno di Toro (Horn of the Bull), Sweet Banana, and Bounty, (which is a named variety of a Sweet Banana  pepper) are good examples.) They are shaped differently, long, squatty, round etc.  One of my new faves is the Violet Sparkle, exhibiting a bevy of beautiful colors as it develops and ripens to a gorgeous deep red. This was the sweetest of the bunch. I found that Feher Ozon Paprika was good for eating fresh. as well as crushing into sweet paprika powder.

Frying Peppers A general term for several different kinds of thin-walled, small peppers. Frying peppers, whether green, red or somewhere in between are actually very mild. and sweet. Jimmy Nardello is a lovely frying peppesr that are also good in a salad. Looks hot but it's not.