from Hacker News

How to ripen and store avocados

by green-eclipse on 11/30/23, 5:05 PM with 179 comments

by stronglikedan on 11/30/23, 7:12 PM
I do the opposite. I buy a bag of green ones, and put them in the fridge. They stay green for a while in there but do start to slowly ripen. Before I put them in the fridge on day 0, I put one on the counter, and one in a brown bag. The brown bag is for day 2, the one on the counter is for day 3 (there is no day 1 after day 0, at first). On day 2, when I take the ripe one out of the bag, I take another out of the fridge and put it on the counter for day 4, and continue this process. When I take the last one out of the fridge, I have another bag ready to go in. With the right timing, this provides a perfectly ripe avocado per day.
And for storing a cut avocado, the press & seal plastic wrap works wonders. The trick is to not let air touch the exposed bit. If it does, then just slicing a thin slice off the top exposes the green part again. (This also works for frozen loaves of bread that have been cut - just a thin slice off the end gets rid of the bit that was destroyed by ice.)
My memoirs will include all my food storage tips for the perpetually single.
by crazygringo on 11/30/23, 5:55 PM
Trying to change the rate at which avocados ripen is way beyond anything I would ever worry about. Because I can't even tell when they're ripe! The article is spot-on when it says (emphasis mine):
> "The window of time in which they are absolutely perfect—soft and tender with no brown spots or streaks—is notoriously short."
But then it claims:
> "...gauge ripeness by touch: Using your fingers, very gently press on the avocado near the stem end (that's where the avocado was once attached to the tree). You want to feel a slight tenderness and give. If the avocado is very firm, it's not ready; if it feels soft and mushy, it's gone too far."
I have gotten this wrong so many times that it seems like useless advice. The skin of the avocado is so stiff and wrinkly by the stem end, you simply cannot tell. By the time you apply enough force to feel through the skin, you're going to explode the avocado.
But if you try pressing against the side, where you can sometimes feel the level of hardness/softness more accurately (if it is a particularly thin-skinned one), you bruise it.
I'm an expert in the kitchen at basically everything else, but trying to figure out if an avocado is ripe or not just absolutely defeats me. I've routinely cut into an avocado I thought was underripe, only to discover it's so over-ripe it's inedible, because the skin all over is so darn tough that the whole thing simply felt rock-hard all over. It's like fossilized reptile skin.
How does anyone do it? I'm talking about regular Hass avocados bought in the northeast US shipped from Mexico.
At the end of the day, I just buy a few, wait 3 days, cut into one, and if it's ripe I try to eat the rest quickly. If not, I throw it out, wait another couple days, and repeat. Ugh.
by alhirzel on 11/30/23, 11:26 PM
For our wedding reception (that we self-catered with a taco bar), we ordered a whole box of 100 avocados through our local school. Of course, we received them about 4 days ahead of time with the rest of the food, most of which would go bad if it sat around any longer. The avocados presented a problem: they wouldn't be ripe in time. After some asking around, we got the tip mentioned in this article, and we interspersed a dozen bananas in the box so we could JIT-compile some guacamole :) It was $4 to save the day!
by RussianCow on 11/30/23, 6:49 PM
If you've already mashed the avocado, you can keep it from browning by adding a little bit of ascorbic acid (vitamin C). Here[0] is a series of tests someone else did to prove that this works. I've personally had guacamole last several days in the fridge with no noticeable browning, but then again, guacamole doesn't last long in my house once it's been made. :)
[0]: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/53406
by andrewla on 11/30/23, 6:30 PM
I was really hoping that this would be a more detailed breakdown of the different methods, like the egg article [1]. This just presented conclusions rather than trying a bunch of avocados and evaluating (objectively or subjectively) their state of ripeness based on the environment.
[1] https://www.seriouseats.com/the-secrets-to-peeling-hard-boil...
by tunapizza on 12/1/23, 12:32 AM
Having toiled in sushi taverns for nigh on a decade, wherein the verdant avocado reigns supreme in North American fare, I have honed my skill in discerning the ripeness of countless avocados each passing annum. Nay, there lies no enchantment in this art, only diligent practice. A keen intuition doth develop with time. Lo and behold, should an avocado err in ripening, fear not. Craft thyself a guacamole or an avocado toast, and the subsequent fruit shall be of greater delight.
(I wrote a reply and asked chatGPT to rewrite it in a medieval style)
by bambax on 11/30/23, 6:10 PM
All true, although the article contains no revelations.
But one important point that is somehow overlooked is that for taste, brown spot don't matter, at all.
Depending on your guests, the preparation you're making, and your love of perfection, brown spots can maybe alter the looks of your dish. But they taste the same.
It would be a great error to prefer an unripe avocado over an over-ripe one for aesthetic reasons only. Unripe avocados are inedible. Over-ripe ones (within reason) taste perfect.
by koolba on 11/30/23, 6:06 PM
> As for mashed avocado like guacamole, we think the best solution, aside from preparing it right before serving, is to press a double layer of plastic wrap directly against the surface of the avocado mixture.
Why a double layer? Does oxygen penetrate the single layer?
by hamerld on 11/30/23, 6:40 PM
I'm surprised they didn't mention storing the avocado with a piece of onion. I just stored one for almost a week with no visible browning thanks to the onion. Just store the 2 cut pieces in a container and store in the fridge.
by kruuuder on 11/30/23, 6:35 PM
Good to know. Now, could someone please write up a similar guide for mangoes? Too many are hard when I buy them, and they start getting mushy after a week, eventually rotting. However, at no point do they become truly ripe and sweet.
by apercu on 11/30/23, 5:54 PM
This is probably sacrilege but after 40 years of being annoyed with avocado ripeness I just routinely buy them and keep them in the fridge. They don't go off and keep for weeks.
by mhb on 11/30/23, 6:42 PM
As it's Serious Eats, I'm disappointed that they didn't test things like submerging the cut or mashed avocado in CO2 (e.g., from SodaStream, etc.) or nitrogen.
by nemo44x on 11/30/23, 6:28 PM
Some higher end refrigerators have various fans/vents/filters to remove ethylene quickly so as to dramatically slow down the decay of fruits and vegetables. In addition they’ll have separate compressors/motors for the fridge and freezer ti keep different humidity levels.
My Sub-Zero made this claim and I was astonished how well it delivers on it. They also give you a guide on which fruits/vegetables to store together.
by Gys on 11/30/23, 7:52 PM
> What about leftover avocado? Any way to keep it from browning? Oxygen is the enemy of avocados—it's what causes them to turn that unsightly brown.
I am very surprised this article nor the comments mention what my wife does: keep the pit inside the mashed avocado. It will stay green much longer!
No idea where she learned this but it works. We always joke to friends this tricks the avocado into thinking it is still complete.
by cmurf on 11/30/23, 10:10 PM
Avocado molesters tend to stay away from the bright green ones. At least they aren't completely dense. Buy these, fridge all but one, and then stagger removal to room temp each day to (eventually) have a perfectly ripe avocado each day rather than a pile of them all at once. Costco bagged avocados have less of a problem with molesters than the grocery store.
3-4 days from bright green will yield a perfectly rip avocado - although on occasion I've had them take 5 days.
The rotten soft spots are from the finger and thumb squeeze given by avocado molesters. And then they will tell you "well how else do you know if they're ripe?" well fuck off, you're ruining perfectly good fruit with your goddamn squeezing and impatience! What did the avocado do to you??
Impatient people deserve packaged guac. Stay away from the avocados!
by gnicholas on 12/1/23, 12:49 AM
> It's not a perfect solution—the avocado will still brown eventually—but you can mix in a minimal amount of browning such that diners won't know, buying yourself at least a few hours before it becomes a problem.
Or you could scrape off the thin layer of oxidized guac, and serve your diners only the fresh parts?
One thing they don't mention is that when you're storing guac in a container, you want to shape it to minimize surface area. This means not using a shallow container, but instead a narrow/tall one. That way you oxidize a smaller fraction of it, which means less waste (or less brown stuff you're mixing in with the fresh parts, if you follow their instructions).
by robg on 11/30/23, 5:38 PM
Brown paper bag, two not fully ripe bananas with every three avocados. Leave for two days.
by OrvalWintermute on 11/30/23, 5:55 PM
This is missing the other avocado trick:
You can put citrus in tight proximity to a cut avocado, or guac, or avocado mash to halt oxidation better than oil. It won't really impact avocado but it will effect guac/mash - it will make your guac mushy and overly acid/citrusy, but it is possible to adjust for it, under-adding citrus to your batch when first making it, by reducing the liquid content added to your guac, and straining with a fine mesh strainer it to purge the extra citrus juice.
It is also possible to replace the citrus with vinegar if you prefer using vinegar for your guac instead of lime juice.
by palidanx on 12/1/23, 2:35 AM
When I used to live in Southern California, there actually are several different varieties of avocadoes with many of them not available in other parts of the country. Some examples are hass, lamb hass, pinkerton, mexicola (where you can eat the skin), and reed avocadoes. Reed avocadoes are my favorite and are the size of 5 hass avocadoes combined with a very buttery mouth taste.. They can take up to 7-12 days to ripe at room temperature, but once cut open, oxidiation is minimal due to the fat content in the avocado.
by b2w on 11/30/23, 6:05 PM
I learned from a chef a while back to apply a thin layer of lemon juice to the smooth face of the avocado to prevent it from browning quickly.
I can usually pick a good hass based off skin tone and feel from the palm of hand if the skin is just beginning to pull away from the face when most ripe.
I tend to store it in the fridge to prolong its ripened state.
They are a daily use in my household for adding calories while more closely preserving the Keto ratio.
by grecy on 11/30/23, 6:41 PM
While driving around Africa I was always buying avos from the side of the road and working on a system to always have one or two ripe.
To make them ripen as fast as possible - stick them in a plastic bag and put it in the full sun. You want them to sweat. They'll ripen in a single day if you get enough sun on them.
To slow them down, throw them in the fridge.
by sokoloff on 11/30/23, 7:45 PM
I've had good outcomes in determining whether an avocado was under-ripe by gently picking at the little nub where the fruit attached to the stem. That is more firmly attached when the fruit is under-ripe and as soon as it easily removes when picked at, I find the avocado is usually near perfect.
by thsksbd on 12/1/23, 2:06 AM
We eat about an avocado a day.
When we're down to the last two or three, we buy a bag or two at Costco (by far the best in our area), and put most of them in a fridge.
Then as we eat the most ripe one we take one out of the fridge.
Then whole ripening thing collapses to optimizing the buffer size.
by niemandhier on 11/30/23, 6:34 PM
Here is the trick that changed my ability to store ripe Avis:
Put them into a container and submerge them under water. Than store the container at below 7 degree centigrade. That seems to stop the ripening process.
It does not work without water. Vacuum sealing also does not work.
by 727374 on 12/1/23, 2:05 AM
Or if you want to eat it right away, make a carpaccio - https://youtube.com/shorts/WZ_orsakLG0
by gweinberg on 11/30/23, 8:14 PM
The avocados we eat are all clones, right? The reason I ask is, it seems to me that avocado sellers ought to be prominently displaying the variety, but in my experience they don't.
by vram22 on 12/1/23, 8:02 AM
Related: in India, people put unripe green bananas in raw rice (uncooked rice), well covered by the rice, and leave them there for a few days to ripen.
by wizofaus on 11/30/23, 6:45 PM
Commercial avocado dips seem to avoid turning brown - admittedly they're usually pretty tasteless but I'd be curious what stops the discoloration.
by sonicanatidae on 11/30/23, 9:21 PM
Avocados are perfectly ripe for about 247 zeptoseconds. After that, they are a black spotted mess.
To those that eat them, I wish you luck!
by damontal on 12/1/23, 3:00 AM
My avocado pet peeve are the ones with long strands of fiber in them. Not sure why they develop or how to avoid them.
by 11235813213455 on 11/30/23, 6:01 PM
Many avocados in stores (at least the lowest price) have almost no taste, not worth it
by pvaldes on 11/30/23, 8:05 PM
Avocados are like oranges. The better way to store them is hanging from the tree.
by amelius on 11/30/23, 6:45 PM
Yeah, I like avocados too, but they're not environmentally friendly.
https://www.veganfoodandliving.com/features/is-our-avocado-o...
by amelius on 11/30/23, 6:42 PM
Why can't supermarkets do this, so you'll always have ripe avocados?
by 1letterunixname on 11/30/23, 7:16 PM
Grow your own from the pits. It will take a long time and some maintenance, but it's possible.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=grow+your+own+a...
by kubatyszko on 11/30/23, 10:58 PM
finally an article that gives more context on the five minute window between avocados being not ripe and then shortly after they're rotten ;)
by hollerith on 11/30/23, 6:26 PM
Because the ripe ones are very moldy, I only ever eat very green avocadoes, and the way I "eat" them is to pay some company to extract the oil from them and sell me the oil.
by locallost on 11/30/23, 6:09 PM
Apples are another possible source of ethylene.
by hardwaregeek on 11/30/23, 8:53 PM
This is an extremely niche solution, but when I need a bunch of perfectly ripe avocados, I order them from the Avocado Guy[1]. It's not that much more expensive than a grocery store (especially considering the avocados are usually on the large side), and they come perfectly ripe each time.
[1]: https://davocadoguy.net
by jader201 on 12/1/23, 2:48 AM
How is this article on the FP, even after 9 hours?
While the topic itself is an interesting discussion (and possibly the main reason it’s being upvoted), the TLDR of this whole article is basically:
- There’s no great way to shop for avocados
- You can sort of tell how ripe one is by feeling the “give” around the stem (though not a guarantee it’s a “good” avocado)
- You can ripen avocados faster in a bag (though still not a guarantee they’ll be good)
- You can’t really store them for later, once cut open
- You can’t really prevent browning
In other words, according to this article, buying avocados is a crapshoot, and if you happen to get a good one, consume it immediately once you cut it.
There is probably better advice in the comments here, but the article itself isn’t very optimistic or helpful.
by mytailorisrich on 11/30/23, 9:27 PM
Counter point: I am from Europe. Local meat is better for the environment than avocados.