Mini Sweet Peppers vs. Bell Peppers

BoomBoom · Aug 26, 2020

Hi Everyone! I'm always after vitamin A rich foods for my bird and bell peppers fit the bill. Problem is, my sun conure doesn't like it. He loves mini sweet peppers though. He eats other vitamin A rich foods but I'd like to focus my question on mini sweet peppers for now.

Are mini sweet peppers comparable in nutritional value to the larger bell peppers? Is it just as good or a lot worse?

Here's what it looks like:

noodles123 · Aug 26, 2020

According to the food label on a bag of mini peppers, they run 35% A per 85 g (no color specified) 270 vit c and 2% iron.
When I looked up red bell peppers, I found 75% A per 119 g, 235% vit c, 1% calcium,, 3% iron.

35/85g=41
75/119g=63

SO, even when you account for differences in serving size, the red bell pepper has more vitamin A.

I wonder though, if they just took the average across colors on the little peppers, because I think it probably varies by color somewhat...and if they did take the average, then it's possible that the mini red peppers and bell peppers could be closer in content than the numbers indicate, but hard to say for sure.

If you are doing minis, if they are anything like regular ones, then the red ones probably have the most vitamin A.

noodles123 · Aug 26, 2020

I just found this comparison of large/full-size bell peppers (ps: if you account for serving size changes, the vitamin A to grams ratio is the same as the one I figured for the red pepper above). Clearly the red ones are best....

If you want to look at IU instead (according to some other sites I found)
mini peppers has 1750.2 IU per 85 g and red bell peppers has 3131 IU per 100g.

wrench13 · Aug 26, 2020

Don't avoid the hot peppers! Parrots, who have 1 taste bud for every 100 we have, seem to enjoy even the hottest types of peppers. I know our YSA loves the really hot ones, like Habenero and Ghost peppers. They all are significant sources of Vit A.

BoomBoom · Aug 28, 2020

Thank you for the responses!!

Noodles123: Beautiful data, thank you. I could never seem to find a reliable source for sweet mini pepper nutrition. I keep ending up on a bell pepper page. So it seems sweet mini peppers have about half, or less than half vitamin A than bells. It's not as bad as I thought! I imagined it to be 25% or less. I do agree that reds are king of the bell peppers in terms of vitamin A content, it is likely the same for the minis. Thank you again. This is so helpful.

Wrench13: I never knew habaneros were vitamin A rich! I've always passed on them thinking they were nutrient-poor like japaneno peppers. I will try them for sure. Thank you!

Mini Sweet Peppers vs. Bell Peppers

BoomBoom

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Onion Danger? ??

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