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Stuffed Peppers

A dish of peppers filled with a fried mixture of bacon, lettuce, tomato, and onion, baked with butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lettuce and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,655 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stuffed Peppers

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Fry the bacon, lettuce, tomato, and onion together.

  2. Remove the seeds from the peppers.

Stuff and bake

  1. Stuff the peppers with the mixture.

  2. Place a small piece of butter on each pepper.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until cooked through.

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. Lettuce + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Lettuce + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Bacon
Renders fat that carries flavor and browns the filling as it fries.
Lettuce
Wilts when cooked, releasing moisture and adding a soft, leafy texture to the filling.
Tomato
Adds moisture and a bright acidity that balances the rich bacon.
Onion
Softens and turns sweeter as it fries, adding aroma to the filling.
Peppers
Form the edible shell that holds the filling and soften as they bake.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps the tops brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Bake until cooked through. Raw pepper walls stay firm and crisp, so the peppers need enough oven time for heat to soften them while the filling cooks through.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, onion, pepper, butter):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, onion, pepper, 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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