Skip to main content
Main

Stuffed Bell Peppers, American Style

Stuffed bell peppers filled with sautéed onions, mushrooms, and breadcrumbs, baked with butter and served with veal gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Stuffed Bell Peppers, American Style

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C).

  2. Slice off the tops of the bell peppers and scoop out the seeds.

  3. In a saucepan, melt the butter and lightly fry the chopped onions.

  4. Add the chopped mushrooms and cover the saucepan until moisture is reduced.

  5. Stir in the reduced Allemande sauce, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  6. Remove from heat and mix in the egg yolks and parsley.

Stuff and bake

  1. Stuff the mixture into the prepared bell peppers and place them in a buttered baking pan.

  2. Sprinkle additional bread crumbs on top and add a small piece of butter to each pepper.

  3. Bake until nicely browned, then serve with a teaspoon of veal gravy over each pepper.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Mushroom + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Bell peppers
Hold the filling and soften in the oven to become tender containers.
Egg yolks
Bind the filling and help it set firm when baked.
Bread crumbs
Add body to the filling and absorb moisture from the mushrooms and sauce.
Mushrooms
Add earthy flavor and savory depth to the filling.
Reduced allemande sauce
Adds richness and moisture, giving the filling a creamy texture.
Onions
Provide sweetness and aromatic flavor as they soften in butter.

The step that matters

Reducing the mushroom moisture. If the mushrooms still release liquid when added to the filling, the mixture becomes watery and may not set well once the egg yolks are added and baked. Cooking them covered until the moisture is reduced keeps the stuffing thick and well bound.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, butter, mushroom, sauce, bread, nutmeg, egg):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, mushroom, sauce, bread, nutmeg, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More stuffed bell peppers recipes

Brazilian 3 See all 65 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesMushroom SoupMushroom Soup60 recipes