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Green pepper has a more bitter taste than red or yellow pepper. (I hope you see what I mean, please tell me if not)

Are there tricks to remove or diminish this bitter taste? A special way of cooking, or adding a bit of sugar or something maybe?

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4 Answers

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Green peppers are green because they are unripe. Unripe fruits and vegetables are naturally more bitter and less sweet than ripe ones. By far the easiest/laziest path is to just use a red pepper. It's essentially the same food, just ripe.

Sugar won't really do anything to the bitterness other than mask it. Salt will. Khymos has written that in parts of Asia, unripe fruit is commonly eaten with salt, salty spices, or soy sauce. These are all excellent options for peppers, as they reduce the bitterness and enhance the taste.

Finally, cook at low heat if possible. Pan-fried peppers tend to be a fair shake bitterer than slow-grilled or oven-roasted peppers.

(P.S. Removing the skin obviously works as well - I personally prefer them unskinned, but if you want to skin them, have a look at this Chow video on it - it's simple to do, you just char the outside and shake it in a plastic bag.)

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P.S. I should have been specific and said that salt doesn't actually eliminate the bitter compounds, but it does actually neutralize the bitter flavour - not just add another flavour on top of it. There's no chemical reaction in the food, but salt is known to interfere with the perception of bitterness in the mouth. – Aaronut♦ Jun 18 '11 at 19:00
I tried the burn-the-skin, slow-cook, generous salt technique, it works well, thanks! – Nicolas Raoul Aug 11 '11 at 5:07
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Much of the bitterness comes from the skin. The skin can be removed with a peeler, or by roasting the pepper until the skin starts to release.

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The best thing is roast the pepper for 15-20' at high temperature then let it cool down (maybe cut it in half to speed up the process). Once cool it's supereasy to peel it. – nico Jun 18 '11 at 14:41
If you put the roasted pepper in a paper bag, or a bowl covered in cling film as it cools, the steam will make it easier to peel. – Joe Feb 24 at 14:54
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Well, the obvious answer is to add a little sugar, though this probably won't make much difference to the actual pepper itself. If you don't want a bitter tasting pepper, why don't you just use a red or yellow one in the first place?

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I live in Japan where red/yellow peppers are much more expensive. – Nicolas Raoul Jun 19 '11 at 3:53
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I cook the pepper using olive oil and don't get that bitter taste. It also could be the combination of seasonings that I use with the olive oil. I have found that Mrs. Dash Tomato/basil/Garlic seasoning does wonders with the green bell pepper.

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