White Pepper Substitute: Best Swaps

Out of white pepper? You already have the same spice: white pepper is black pepper with its outer layer removed. Stripping the skin takes much of the aroma with it,¹ but when a recipe uses only a little, America’s Test Kitchen’s tasters had a hard time telling the two apart. When white pepper is the main flavor, as in hot and sour soup, black pepper comes across spicier and more aromatic, so start with less. And for a pale cream sauce where dark specks would show, ground green peppercorns are worth a look.

Quick answer

What white pepper is doing	Best substitute	Starting amount, per 1 part white pepper	Treatment
A small amount of seasoning in a stir-fry or sauce	Finely ground black pepper	1 part	Method
A lead flavor (hot and sour soup, peppery broths)	Finely ground black pepper	1/2 part, then taste	Method
Bite without dark specks in a pale dish	Ground dried green peppercorns, or finely ground black pepper	1 part green; 1/2 part black	Method

How the ratios on this page are labeled

Every ratio carries one of four labels.

Computed: based on a measurable physical relationship.
Attributed: a named source publishes this ratio. We quote it as theirs.
Disputed: named sources give different answers to the same swap. You get each one, side by side.
Method: our starting point, based on how the two compare. Taste and adjust.

America’s Test Kitchen tested black pepper in place of white at the same amount and reported how it tasted.

How white and black pepper differ

Named sources disagree about which is hotter. They agree that white is less aromatic.

Source	What it says
Britannica²	White pepper’s flavor is less pungent than black pepper’s
Gernot Katzer³	White pepper keeps the full pungency of black pepper; pungency is strongest in white and weakest in green
Codex CXS 326-2017⁴	Sets a higher piperine minimum for Grade I whole white pepper (4.0%) than for Grade I black (3.5%); minimums, not measurements
America’s Test Kitchen¹	Removing the skin strips much of the volatile oils and aroma compounds

On aroma, Katzer says black and green peppercorns are more aromatic than white. He also warns that white pepper kept too long can pick up a fecal, musty note, which nobody’s trying to copy.³ White pepper has a character of its own, too. In ATK’s test, tasters preferred the white-pepper soup for its “floral, earthy flavor and greater complexity.”¹

If white pepper is a small amount of seasoning

Black pepper

Ratio (Method): ATK found that in a stir-fry calling for a small amount of white pepper, tasters had a hard time telling it apart from black, and its advice is to substitute only when the amount called for is small.¹ One-for-one is our reading of its test. Grind the black pepper as finely as you can.

If white pepper is a lead flavor

East Asian cooks often prefer white pepper, and it’s popular in Japan. In dishes built around it, like hot and sour soup, black pepper changes the result. ATK made hot and sour soup with 1 teaspoon of black or white pepper. Tasters found the black-pepper version more aromatic, with more spicy heat, and preferred the white. For a recipe that leans on a fair amount of white pepper for flavor, ATK doesn’t recommend swapping in black.¹

Ratio (Method): If black pepper is all you’ve got, start with about half the amount of white pepper called for, since ATK’s tasters found the same amount spicier and more aromatic. Taste, and add more toward the end. The soup will still taste different.

If the dish is pale

Katzer says white pepper is often suggested for cream-based sauces where black pepper could spoil the color,³ and ATK notes that some recipes call for white pepper when you want an evenly light-colored result.¹

1. Dried green peppercorns, ground

Green pepper comes from the same plant, made from green berries dried under controlled conditions. Ground, it’s greenish, not black, so it shows less in a white sauce. Katzer rates its pungency the weakest of the three and its aroma higher than white pepper’s.³

Ratio (Method): Start with an equal amount and add more if the bite is too gentle.

Brined or pickled green peppercorns are a different product. In one Kerala Agricultural University process, the berries sit in a 17 percent salt solution,⁵ so rinse them and expect saltiness. They’re better crushed into a pan sauce than ground into béchamel.

2. A little finely ground black pepper

Ratio (Method): In small amounts, black specks are hard to see. Start with half the white pepper amount, finely ground, and add more only if you don’t mind the specks.

Substitutes that work less well

Substitute	What the sources say	Use it?
Pink peppercorns	Not pepper at all: the fruit of Schinus trees in the cashew family, native to South America. Katzer says they are named for their shape only and describes them as sweet and aromatic, like juniper.⁶ Atlas Obscura calls the flavor only slightly peppery.⁷ True pepper, Piper nigrum, belongs to a different family, Piperaceae.	For color and perfume, not bite
Ground ginger	Its pungency comes from gingerols and related compounds, not piperine.⁸ It is pale but adds an unmistakable ginger flavor.	Only where ginger belongs in the dish
Mustard powder	Its heat appears only when the powder is mixed with water, as the enzyme myrosinase acts on sinigrin to form allyl isothiocyanate.⁹ Sprinkled dry into a sauce, it behaves differently from pepper, and it is yellow, not white.	Only where mustard suits the dish

What isn’t known

Named sources disagree on whether white pepper is hotter or milder than black (see the table above).
You’ll sometimes read that green peppercorns are milder than white and should be used at one and a half times the amount, and that pink peppercorns can replace white pepper one for one. We found no source for either figure.

“Substituting Black Pepper for White Pepper”, America’s Test Kitchen. americastestkitchen.com · Publication ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶
“Black pepper”, Encyclopaedia Britannica. britannica.com · Reference work ↩
Gernot Katzer, “Black Pepper (Piper nigrum L.)”, Gernot Katzer’s Spice Pages. gernot-katzers-spice-pages.com · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
Standard for Black, White and Green Peppers, CXS 326-2017, Codex Alimentarius. fao.org · Standard ↩
Pepper: Processing and Value Addition, Kerala Agricultural University. celkau.in · Reference work ↩
Gernot Katzer, “Pink Pepper (Schinus terebinthifolius and S. molle)”, Gernot Katzer’s Spice Pages. gernot-katzers-spice-pages.com · Reference work ↩
Anne Ewbank, “When People Panicked Over Pink Peppercorns”, Atlas Obscura, 2018. atlasobscura.com · Publication ↩
Sutarno, Hadad and Brink, Zingiber officinale, Plant Resources of South-East Asia (PROSEA). uses.plantnet-project.org · Reference work ↩
Sandra Gutierrez G., “When the mustard shortage hits, make your own”, Popular Science, 2022. popsci.com · Publication ↩

Also drawn on

Piper nigrum L., Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. powo.science.kew.org
Schinus terebinthifolia Raddi, Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. powo.science.kew.org

White Pepper Substitutes, Ranked by the Job White Pepper Is Doing