Purple bell pepper...tiny and already purple?

[JLudin]

A while back I had made a post noting that all of my bell pepper plants had either some sort of deficiency or they were over-watered in the month of June (nearly set records here for rainfall). Well, during the long, drawn out heat stretch I literally had not watered them ONCE, a stretch of about 21 days. They seemed to have recovered VERY nicely, getting lush and producing a lot of flowers now. Much to my excitement, I finally noticed one of the plants had finally pushed out a small, purple bell pepper. I attached a pic of it below. However, I can't help but notice that it is already deep purple in color. I did a little looking online for "little purple bell peppers" and every picture I had found showed them being twice as big as the one in my picture and still green. They are supposed to RIPEN to purple.

Any thoughts? Should I pick it so nutrients go into feeding the other buds? I'm desperate for bell peppers this year, given the aforementioned issue.

[Francis Barnswallow]

Mine are about that size as well. The plants are producing many of these little guys even with the current heat conditions. But mine are rainbow peppers, so I'm guessing it's normal to have small peppers.

[SPierce]

My one pepper that I did get last year also ripened when it was a little bigger than a golf ball. It may be tiny, but i Promise that it's actually still pretty yummy

[jal_ut]

Yes, that pepper is ripe. Enjoy.

I would give them a drink once a week.

[garden5]

I grew purple peppers and my first one did the same thing last year. It was less than 2 in. in diameter, but I picked it and it still tasted good.

[JLudin]

I ate it today and was awfully bitter! I know purple bells are supposed to be a tad more bitter than greens, but it tasted like a young, unripe bell to me. I couldn't even eat the entire thing. Not sure what's going on in that garden.

[gixxerific]

Pick it. I had purples that didn't get very big either. But if you pick it maybe the next ones will get bigger.