Growing Cubanelle Peppers: A Complete Profile
By Growing Home Greens Team · September 30, 2026
Cubanelle is the long, pale sweet pepper that a lot of Caribbean cooks reach for instead of a bell. Baker Creek describes 6 to 8 inch fruit with thin walls and low water content, which is why it browns in a pan rather than steaming.
Picked yellow-green for frying and roasting
Most cubanelles are picked while still yellow-green, the stage Baker Creek recommends for roasting and frying. Left on the plant they ripen through orange to red and get sweeter. Heat is minimal: Pepper Joe’s rates it 0 to 1,000 Scoville units, and Baker Creek notes the occasional fruit carries only a touch of warmth.
A quick, compact plant
Seed sellers put it at 60 to 75 days from transplant (Baker Creek says 65 to 75, Pepper Joe’s 60 to 69), so it is one of the faster sweet peppers to give a first picking. Pepper Joe’s lists plants at about 3 feet. One plant per square foot is enough in the Garden Designer.
Start it indoors about eight weeks before your last frost, the same as a bell, and hold off transplanting until nights stay warm. The Bell Pepper profile covers the watering and transplant basics all peppers share, and the companion guide for cubanelle lists what to plant nearby.
Hot nights and dropped flowers
Pepper flowers fall off without setting fruit when nights stay above about 75°F, per the University of Delaware’s Weekly Crop Update. In zones 9 and up, expect a midsummer gap in fruiting; our zone pages flag it.
Growing it next to other peppers
Different pepper varieties cross-pollinate easily, hot ones included. NC State Extension notes that when hot and sweet peppers cross, the heat shows up in later generations grown from saved seed, and suggests keeping varieties 20 to 30 feet apart if you plan to save your own. Baker Creek, which grows seed for sale, isolates varieties by at least 500 feet. If you buy fresh seed each year, you can plant sweet and hot peppers side by side.
Sources: Baker Creek, Cubanelle; Pepper Joe’s, Cubanelle; NC State Extension, Saving Your Own Seed; University of Delaware Weekly Crop Update.
Companion planting guide for Cubanelle Pepper · Find your planting dates
Typically viable in USDA zones 3-11. Not sure your zone? Look it up by ZIP code.
Mature height: 2-3 ft
Method: Start indoors: Start indoors from seed, then transplant outside. It needs a head start most zones can't give it by direct-sowing alone.
When to plant cubanelle pepper, by zone
Every zone cubanelle pepper grows in. Pick your zone in the header and it will be highlighted here. Each zone links to its full page.
| Zone | Start indoors | Sow or plant out | Harvest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3a & 3b | Apr 4–Apr 11 | Jun 13–Jun 20 | Aug 22–Aug 29 |
| 4a & 4b | Mar 20–Mar 27 | May 29–Jun 5 | Aug 7–Aug 14 |
| 5a & 5b | Mar 15–Mar 22 | May 24–May 31 | Aug 2–Aug 9 |
| 6a & 6b | Feb 28–Mar 7 | May 9–May 16 | Jul 18–Jul 25 |
| 7a & 7b | Feb 13–Feb 20 | Apr 24–May 1 | Jul 3–Jul 10 |
| 8a & 8b | Jan 28–Feb 4 | Apr 8–Apr 15 | Jun 17–Jun 24 |
| 9a & 9b | Dec 21–Dec 28 | Mar 1–Mar 8 | May 10–May 17 |
| 10a & 10bSpring window | Dec–Feb | Feb–Apr | ~70 days after transplanting |
| Summer window | May–Jul | Jul–Sep | ~70 days after transplanting |
| 11a & 11bSummer window | Jun–Dec | Aug–Feb | ~70 days after transplanting |
Harvest dates are about 70 days after the sow or plant-out date, not after starting seeds indoors.
See exact start-indoors, direct-sow, and harvest dates for your zone →
How many Cubanelle Pepper plants fit per square foot?
Spacing: 1 per square foot (square-foot-gardening spacing). Mature height: 2-3 ft.
Soil & water: pH 6-6.5. Needs well-drained soil. Amend with lime if soil pH falls below 6.
Good companions for cubanelle pepper
- Basil: Reputed to repel aphids and improve pepper growth nearby, but a controlled garden trial testing this same claim on a related crop found no pest-reduction benefit from basil, and found higher pest counts on the basil-companioned plants. Treat this pairing as unproven, not as a working pest deterrent.
- Onion: Reputed to deter many common pepper pests, though this specific pairing hasn't been tested the way onion/carrot pest-masking has. Treat it as garden tradition.
Full companion guide, including what to keep away from cubanelle pepper →
Where to buy cubanelle pepper seeds
True Leaf Market (cubanelle pepper seeds)
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See it growing
Search YouTube for "growing cubanelle pepper" videos → (a live search, not a hand-picked video; results vary and aren't vetted by us)
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Growing Cubanelle Pepper: A thin-walled sweet frying pepper from Cuban, Puerto Rican and Dominican cooking, picked yellow-green.
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