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Stuffed Peppers

A savory dish of green peppers filled with a sautéed mixture of onion, mushrooms, ground meats, and bread crumbs, topped with buttered crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Mushroom and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Stuffed Peppers

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the peppers

  1. Cut off the tops of the green peppers and remove the seeds.

  2. Parboil the peppers for 10 minutes.

  3. Chop the tops of the peppers finely.

Make the filling

  1. In a skillet, sauté the chopped tops, onion, and mushrooms in butter for 12 minutes.

  2. Add flour, brown stock, ground chicken, ground ham, and bread crumbs. Season with salt, pepper, and parsley.

  3. Cool the mixture, then stuff the peppers with it.

Bake and serve

  1. Sprinkle with buttered bread crumbs and bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

  2. Serve with white sauce.

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. Mushroom + chickentop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

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

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

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

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

  4. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Onion + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Green peppers
Hollow shells that hold the filling and soften when parboiled and baked.
Butter
Fat that sautés the vegetables and adds richness to the filling.
Flour
Thickens the stock so the filling holds together instead of running out.
Brown stock
Adds moisture and savoury depth to the filling.
Ground chicken
Provides protein that firms up and gives the filling body as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and help bind the filling, and brown on top when baked.

The step that matters

Cool the mixture before stuffing. A hot filling softens the parboiled pepper shells and can make them tear or collapse. Cooling it first lets the filling hold its shape inside the peppers.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mushroom, butter, flour, chicken, ham, bread):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mushroom, butter, flour, chicken, ham, bread. 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.

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