Bitter green peppers grown in pots ... how to make them more palatable ?

For years I've grown green pepper plants in pots. They flower, they fruit! That part usually isn't an issue.

But the fruit is bitter! It tastes very vegetal, almost grass-like.

This seems to happen no matter what variety I try: regular old bell, shishito, and so forth.

How do I encourage "sweeter" fruit? Obviously these are green peppers, not red. But I'd like to ensure more palatable fruit.

We quit growing peppers for this reason.

I don't have an answer.  I thought it might be our soil or maybe it was our alkaline water?

I hope someone will be able to give us the answers.

Do you harvest them ripe or green? When a bell pepper turns red it will be a bit sweeter. Also how do you prep your pepper? Eating raw? Bake? Or stir fry? I am wonder if the "bitter" taste is actually what a bell pepper is supposed to taste. Grocery store peppers are huge and tasteless. When I grow my own peppers, I finally get the real pepper flavor in my childhood memory.

May, when we first started growing bell peppers they were sweet.

I liked them for salads though I add diced peppers to gumbo. We also like to make stuffed peppers with them

I noticed the bitterness when the color was not quite right for bell peppers. The peppers were not bright green like at the store.

We are not fond of them when the peppers start turning red.

The grocery store peppers were $3.00 for one pepper before prices started going up and that is out of my budget range.

Anne Miller wrote:

I noticed the bitterness when the color was not quite right for bell peppers. The peppers were not bright green like at the store

I want to make sure we are talking about the same pepper. The green immature one is sold as bell pepper in grocery store. If left weeks longer to mature it will turn colors. There are varieties of red, purple, orange or yellow and they sell for a higher price.
My peppers tend to hide pretty well under the shade of leaves. Occasionally some are more exposed to intense sunlight. They either get sunburn spots or have almost black color on the shoulders. I am wondering if that could lead to the bitter taste.

You might want to try letting one fruit grow all the way until it dries up on the vine, just to see what color the fruit is at its latest stage. There are truly green bell peppers, but most are red, orange, or yellow when they are truly biologically ripe. Letting one fruit sit on the plant until it ripens and finally dries out is one sure way to know your pepper’s true color.

Once you know that, you can start trying the fruits at different color stages to see when it tastes the best to you. Generally speaking, the more ripe the fruit, the sweeter the taste.

I would love to hear the OP's (original poster's) thoughts on this.

As far as our pepper plants, dear hubby bought them as transplants, and I feel part of the problem was the supplier.  One year the grocery store sold plants by Chef John and the next year the supplier was Chef Bob.

The supplier called them "Bell peppers" as far as I can remember.

Since we quit trying to grow them this is all just from memory.

When I lived in Mexico they sold two kinds of peppers at the grocery store "sweet peppers and paprika peppers" and according to Wikipedia they are the same pepper:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_pepper

Bell peppers could turn bitter if not watered enough. Was the flesh thin too? If so it could very well be under watered.

The sweetness of our crops comes from the mineralization of the soil.   When the plant has all the minerals it needs and the conditions for health, it will make the most magnificent fruit.  

If the fruit is bitter the plant did not have the tools it needed to make the best fruit.

Peppers are pretty heavy feeders.  Having them in pots is great to give them the warmth they need but it has some drawbacks.  They are likely out of some nutrients, their root structure is limited and you have to give them what they need when they need it.  It takes a lot more thought and paying attention.

If they are growing in a hugel bed, they can send their roots down to get whatever nutrients they need to be healthy.  You have put all the materials in there and the plant will choose what it needs at the different stages of growth.


When you have plants in pots it is just like when you put an animal in close confinement, you are now responsible to provide all they need to thrive.

An excellent gardener I know, goes out every year and gets fresh prairie soil for his potted crops.


One quick and easy way is to give your pee to the plants.   You gotta be careful not to give them a nitrogen burn though.  The more green vegetative growth they have the more pee they can use.  When they get too green they are at their limit.  If they get burned you will want to flush lots of water through their pot.

Nature's solution to pollution is dilution.

Joe Hallmark wrote:Bell peppers could turn bitter if not watered enough. Was the flesh thin too? If so it could very well be under watered.

Hi, Joe

You might be on the right track.

The best I can remember is that we watered the plants usually when the plants said they wanted water.

I saw a thread in the "Similar Threads" below and here is my post from 2017:

Anne said, "This year our Bell Peppers were bitter tasting.  Was it the variety?

Can someone suggest a variety that is sweet tasting when grown in hot dry weather?

https://permies.com/t/52488/Bell-Peppers-Texas#598185

Put a little bit of cal/phos in water and water your plants.  They are merely deficient causing that bitterness.  Phosphorous makes them sweet, makes them fruit more.  Calcium governs uptake of all other nutrients so it is needed too.

I let mine turn red and then they are sweet.