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Baked Peppers

A baked dish of green bell peppers stuffed with minced meat and bread, topped with gravy, butter, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Baked Peppers

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 peppers

  1. Boil the bell peppers in water for 5 minutes without allowing it to boil.

  2. Remove the peppers and rub off the skins with a wet cloth.

  3. Cut off the stem ends and remove the seeds.

Stuff and bake

  1. Stuff the peppers with minced cold meat mixed with an equal amount of softened stale bread, seasoned with salt and sage.

  2. Replace the stem ends and place the peppers in a deep dish.

  3. Cover the peppers with cold gravy mixed with butter and water.

  4. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

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. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 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

Green bell peppers
Form the edible shell that holds the filling and softens during baking.
Cold meat
Provides the savoury filling that is bound together with the bread.
Stale bread
Soaks up milk and helps bind the filling so it stays moist rather than crumbly.
Gravy
Keeps the peppers moist in the oven and adds savoury flavour to the surrounding sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the gravy, aiding browning and flavour.

The step that matters

Boil the peppers without letting the water boil. Gentle simmering at just under boiling softens the peppers enough to stuff and fold without tearing or turning mushy, while keeping their shape intact.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, meat, bread, milk, butter):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, meat, bread, milk, butter. 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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