Paprika red

Paprika grows on a bush that grows 30-100 cm high. The fruits, "peppers", come in many shapes, colours and sizes. The round or blocky to elongated narrow and pointed pods reach fist size and up to 250 g in weight. The smooth, shiny skin can be red, yellow, green, but also orange, white, purple and black. Inside there are fruit chambers and seeds. Paprika tastes crisp and fresh and mildly spicy.

Origin

The pepper plant is native to the tropics of South and Central America. Spanish conquerors brought it from there to Europe in the 16th century, where it was first cultivated solely as an ornamental plant and only later as a vegetable. Today it is cultivated in numerous countries, including Italy, France, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Hungary, Israel and many African, Asian, Central and South American countries. In Germany, too, peppers are now an integral part of the vegetable assortment. Peppers are available all year round, most heavily from summer to late autumn, especially from Spain, Italy, Hungary, Turkey and the Netherlands.

Main varieties

The distinction between vegetable and spice peppers (hot peppers, Spanish pepper) is based on the taste or the content of the alkaloid capsaicin, which is present in disproportionately higher amounts in the latter. Spicy peppers usually form tapered pods of up to 15 cm in length. The flesh is firmer and thicker-skinned, hot to very hot (depending on the capsaicin content) and spicy. Another type of pepper besides sweet and spicy peppers is the tomato pepper, which was bred in Hungary a hundred years ago and could be mistaken for a cross between sweet peppers and tomatoes. The fruit walls of the tomato pepper are fleshy and juicy. The fruit has a sharper flavour than sweet peppers, but is much sweeter. This type of pepper is eaten like tomatoes or other peppers.

Tips

When shopping, make sure the fruit is firm, smooth and shiny. Wrinkles and spots indicate too long storage with loss of vitamins and aroma. Peppers taste particularly fine when skinned (for this purpose, briefly scald them with boiling water).

Preparation

Wash the fruit, cut open, remove the stalk, inner septum and seeds and use the pods as desired. Peppers are eaten raw, as a salad, stewed or cooked, on their own or together with other vegetables as a hot vegetable, stew or sour vegetable. Very popular are peppers with rice/meat fillings.