# Fruit that never ripens ... do you ask for your money back?



## mind_business (Sep 24, 2011)

Not sure if this is specific to SW Ontario ... but I doubt it, but buying fruit at our grocery stores is hit or miss. The fruit looks great at the store, requiring a bit more time to ripen before eating it. But I would say that at least 50% of our fruit skips the ripen stage and goes directly to over-ripe/spoiled. This is not limited to just winter purchases. The only fruits that are consistently good are apples and bananas (along with some other more tropical fruits - pineapple, etc). In the summer, we try to buy locally grown fruit, but the pears, and other fruits never ripen properly (mealy-sp?).

Does anyone here have any suggestions? Have you ever successfully returned the spoiled fruit to the grocery store for a refund


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

there are so many fruits & vegetables with skins now that don't ripen but instead they spoil from within. Pears are especially notorious for this, i find. They can still look great a few days after purchase, but when you cut them the decay is spreading out from the core.

the reason is the heavy fungicides all these fruits & vegs are drenched with. To preserve them perfectly until the moment of sale.

winter squash are other bad candidates. Normally a winter squash will keep a very few months, say up to Xmas, at cool temperatures. But now, they "keep" through the winter, always looking stunningly normal & fresh as a daisy. But underneath its heavy peel such a squash, when finally cut open, often turns out to be decaying from its inner core seeds outwards.

it's never occurred to me to return these fruits/vegetables to the store. One individual solution is to buy organic only.

faced with mass consumer resistance, the food industry is going to resist eliminating fungicide baths & drenches because it cannot tolerate the spoilage that would occur. Prices would have to rise.

on a slightly-related topic, yesterday i was reading in the toronto Star's investigations section about the horsemeat scandal. I had not been thinking it was any kind of scandal. I was just thinking that some people normally eat horsemeat, i would never, so what's the big deal?

but the Star's series explains how most of these horses are old race horses that have frequently been fed performance-enhancing stimulant drugs that are known carcinogens in humans. Apparently most of these old racehorses sent to canadian abattoirs come from the US, which is not allowed to slaughter old race horses for food, so they ship the animals to canada.

yikes. There was excellent documentation of conflicting laws & regulations governing horse meat for human consumption canada. Particularly how the horse dealers fake their ownership certificates when they ship the animals to the abattoirs. They're supposed to furnish certificates stating each horse has been in their possession for at least 6 months & during that time the animal has been given no drugs whatsoever. The horrifying fact is that all the horse dealers fake their certificates & the abattoirs go along with this.

i promptly regretted the extra-lean minced beef i've occasionally bought for hamburgers at home - because i now suspect it may be laced with racehorse meat from these abattoirs, 2 of which are located close to my city. I'll never buy minced beef again. If we ever start craving hamburgers to desperation, i'll buy a whole piece of beef & get the butcher to grind it up in front of my eyes. Not all butchers can do that, so i'll have to find an old-fashioned butcher who can.

plus i'll make the effort & go to the expense of sourcing meat from known organic farms only.

food budget going up!! but quality food is a priority for me, i'm happy to economize elsewhere, but not on the table.





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## MoneyGal (Apr 24, 2009)

Humble! High quality meat is VERY EASY to mince at home. You can either do it with two knives (and some perseverance) or locate one of the old hand-grinders that attaches to your countertop, likely at a thrift store or estate sale. (Of course you can also buy a grinder attachment for your KitchenAid mixer, or buy a dedicated meat grinder - but you do not need to.)


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

hey u know what? adrift in my cellar is a box containing my grandmother's hand-turned meat grinder. I believe it might have been cast iron. It got screwed onto a table edge. My mother used it. I haven't seen the thing since she passed away & i packed it up in her kitchen.

i have so got to clean up my basement ...


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## MoneyGal (Apr 24, 2009)

Yes! That's what I use: for mincing meat, and for making cranberry-orange relish, and for making the steamed suet pudding we eat at Xmas.


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## mind_business (Sep 24, 2011)

humble_pie said:


> there are so many fruits & vegetables with skins now that don't ripen but instead they spoil from within. Pears are especially notorious for this, i find. They can still look great a few days after purchase, but when you cut them the decay is spreading out from the core.
> 
> the reason is the heavy fungicides all these fruits & vegs are drenched with. To preserve them perfectly until the moment of sale.
> 
> ...


Related to fruit, if buying organic will solve the problem for me, it will likely have a positive effect on our budget. Yes higher initial purchase price, but much less wasteage. Thanks for the suggestion. I've never bought organic before, but I may have a reason to now 

Any other suggestions, or stories of returning fruit to the store? As you can probably tell, I've very tempted to bring our last batch of fruit back. It's pathetic!


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## crazyjackcsa (Aug 8, 2010)

The organic doesn't keep longer, it spoils more naturally from the outside in.

Keep in mind, it's also the winter. Most of our vegetables aren't being grown close to home. Shipping and handling will shorten the end users shelf life.


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## mind_business (Sep 24, 2011)

crazyjackcsa said:


> The organic doesn't keep longer, it spoils more naturally from the outside in.
> 
> Keep in mind, it's also the winter. Most of our vegetables aren't being grown close to home. Shipping and handling will shorten the end users shelf life.


In your post above, you mentioned vegetables. We actually don't have any problems with vegetables ... only fruit. Although we see this problem in the summer, winter purchases see the highest wasteage of all the seasons, so I guess winter is where a solution would need to be focused on. 

My wife and I have been changing our eating habits dramatically over the last year, so giving up on fruits in the winter is not an option. Trying new fruits might be. I'm a bit gun-shy though. We bought a passion-fruit a while back, and I broke out in hives after eating some ... and I have no other allergies that I'm aware of. I guess that's why I usually buy the stuff I'm familiar with.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

crazyjackcsa said:


> The organic doesn't keep longer, it spoils more naturally from the outside in.


this is fine, imho. This is what is supposed to happen.

the issue is the heavy fungicide drenching, which organic produce isn't subjected to. I for one think it's better to avoid eating fungicides & pesticides whenever one can.

as for organic fruits & vegetables not lasting after purchase, one can buy frequently & from good sources.

someone was telling me that she avoids a small greek grocery store that i like because of its fresh fruits & vegs. She avoids this store, she said, because the fresh produce goes bad so quickly in her frig.

whereas, she said, produce from the big grocery chain in the neighbourhood lasts in her frig for weeks & weeks ...

"but going bad quickly is what you want," i said. "It means the produce hasn't been drenched & sprayed to death, in trucks & warehouses."


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## MoneyGal (Apr 24, 2009)

humble_pie said:


> someone was telling me that she avoids a small greek grocery store that i like because of its fresh fruits & vegs. She avoids this store, she said, because the fresh produce goes bad so quickly in her frig.
> 
> whereas, she said, produce from the big grocery chain in the neighbourhood lasts in her frig for weeks & weeks ...


Ack! Horrifying. 

p.s. the solution (for your friend) is to buy what you need in a week, and then eat it. Amazing!


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

u don't think the solution is to turn her back on the big centralized supermarket chain & shop chez the small greek?

the greek grocery is a family business. One of the brothers personally buys produce daily at the marché central. This is montreal's gigantic wholesale greengrocer market, hours from 3 am to 8 am early every morning.

produce is then trucked immediately from marché central to each of their tiny chain of 3 grocery store outlets. Total time in transit: 2 hours. Total time in warehouse: zero. Need for additional fungicide/pesticide spraying because of warehouse storage & transshipment: zero.


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## MoneyGal (Apr 24, 2009)

Well, it could be! But it also seems that buying fruit/vegetables and then expecting it to last FOR WEEKS in her house is the bigger issue. Meal planning! Frugality! To each crisper drawer in accordance with your weekly wants, from each crisper drawer in accordance with your weekly needs!


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

HP, most produce is not treated with any pesticides or fungicides outside of the farm. And pesticide licenses limit how late these substances can be applied prior to harvest.

Most of the produce that goes through city produce markets (like the Food Terminal in Etobicoke) comes from the same sources as the big grocers use. And it is not necessarily fresher, as the big grocers import directly from the US to their warehouses and out to stores. Produce that goes through these central markets could potentially dwell longer, there.

The problem with produce that does not ripen properly is that it was picked too green. Some fruits are also bred for transport rather than taste, which is partly why strawberries from California and Florida are awful compared to locally grown. Same with peaches, plums, and other soft fruit.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

andrewf said:


> Some fruits are also bred


or GM.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Selective breeding is by definition GM. Every domesticated plant or animal is unnatural and an abomination before God/Gaia.


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

This reminds me of an unseen advantage to snowbirding. We always eat fresh. Local produce from Mexico in the winter and the Fraser Valley in the summer. I particularly like mango, papaya and pineapple...


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## fraser (May 15, 2010)

We recently spent six weeks in Costa Rica. We found that the fruit, especially the pineapple, had a much better taste. We ate a pineapple a day because it was so good. I think the wonderful difference in taste was attributable to the fruit ripening on the vine instead of being picked green.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

fraser said:


> We recently spent six weeks in Costa Rica. We found that the fruit, especially the pineapple, had a much better taste. We ate a pineapple a day because it was so good. I think the wonderful difference in taste was attributable to the fruit ripening on the vine instead of being picked green.


I wonder if there would be a market for flying in tropical fruit. A lot of it is picked very early and as a result tastes terrible.


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## Beaver101 (Nov 14, 2011)

mind_business said:


> Not sure if this is specific to SW Ontario ... .
> Does anyone here have any suggestions? Have you ever successfully returned the spoiled fruit to the grocery store for a refund


 ... Have never bothered to return the spoiled fruit to grocery store or supermarket for a refund, not worth the time and the hassle. Have returned meat that smelled chemically funny (iodine) though - supermarket wasn't aware the meat handler had cut himself and as a result of iodinizing the cut, the meathandler contaminated the beef. Thought best to let them know before someone gets sick.

How about buying can or jarred peaches, pears, etc. in the winter? Not the fresh-right-off-the-tree but Delmont/Dole has some nice peach halves or fruit cocktail mix. If labour or price is not an issue, buy local and can the fruits in the summer. An alternative suggestion not seen in any of the posts above.


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