A method claimed to make apples last weeks has been revealed. Fruits often spoil rather quickly because of the ethylene gas they produce. The natural gas plays a crucial role in the ripening process, triggering things such as softening, aroma development, and colour changes. While it has its benefits, apples being high ethylene producers means that the fruit is subject to going bad fairly quickly.
However, if stored properly, the process can be slowed down, so much so that your apples will still be good to eat after six weeks. According to The Kitchn, all you need is newspaper and a cardboard box.
The recipe and home website tested out seven different methods to store apples, but the one method which they rated a ten out of ten kept the apples fresh for over six weeks.
All you need to do is individually wrap your apples in newspaper, arrange them in a single layer in a cardboard box and keep them in a cupboard away from other fruits and vegetables that produce ethylene gas.
According to The Kitchn, all of the apples looked “just as pretty” as they did the day they were purchased. The apples were “bright, smooth, unblemished skins and firm flesh with no soft spots. They tasted of sweet-tart perfection, retaining all of the juiciness you expect from a pristine Honeycrisp apple.”
Wrapping the apples individually helped to contain each one’s ethylene gas emissions, which meant that if one went bad it wouldn’t ruin the others or cause them to spoil.
If you’re out of cupboard space, another method that also keeps the apples fresh for more than six weeks is to put the fruit in a sealed paper bag and place it in your fridge salad drawer.
This method, rated 9.8, resulted in the apples looking “mostly perfect after six weeks.” While one of the three apples used in the test did have a blemish near the stem, “they remained firm and unpsoiled” while tasting “incredibly crisp and juicy.”
However, the newspaper and cupboard method is ultimately the best way to ensure that you make the most of all the apples in your batch.
