When shopping for fruit at your favourite grocery store or local farmer’s market, you may be inclined to buy too much or even too little. The same can be said when you send a fruit basket as a gift to someone special. As important as it is for the fruit display to be attractive, it also needs to be practical. For example, if you’re buying a fruit basket for one person, it will be significantly smaller than the one you’ll be sending to a family. Another important point to consider is the shelf life of fresh fruit. How long can you really keep it going before it starts to deteriorate?

 

Ripe fruit

The key is to take note of how ripe the fresh fruit is when you buy it. Overripe fruit deteriorates much faster than ripening fruit. Therefore, if you are going to stock up for a few days, you should choose several ripe fruits and some that have not yet ripened. When you run out of ripe fruit, the rest will be ripe and ready to enjoy!

Quicker to spoil

Fresh fruit that can go bad within a couple of days after ripening include avocados, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries and cherries. It’s also important to note that green avocados can ripen faster by placing them next to some bananas. Bananas impart certain properties that speed up the process in avocados. However, once your avocados are ripe, you’ll need to keep those bananas away!

 

Longer life

Fresh fruit that lasts more than a full week include blueberries, apples and pomegranates. While most other fruits will last up to a week. These include apricots, grapefruit, clementines, oranges, kiwis, lemons, plums, limes, pears, tangerines, lychees and watermelon.

 

Damaged fruit

It’s also a good idea to look for healthy fresh fruit. Damaged fruit, even if not yet ripe, can go bad as soon as it ripens! Bruised bananas are a good example. When choosing bananas, be sure to check them thoroughly for any type of mishandling. The bruises will cause the flesh of the fruit under the skin to turn black without you realizing it.

 

If you notice your fresh fruit starting to spoil, you should remove it from the bin or basket immediately. The saying “A bad apple ruins the bunch” is no lie! As soon as an apple, pear, peach or any other fruit starts to rot, the bacteria invade other fruits and cause them to go bad. If you have too much fruit and don’t know what to do with it, there are many great preservation techniques, from making jam or dried fruit to freezing it.