Buying avocados in a supermarket can be stressful, as it’s sometimes difficult to know whether they’re ripe or not. Another issue many shoppers face is brown spots on the inside. While testing the ripeness of an avocado is fairly simple, telling if the fruit is brown inside is a bit more challenging. Luckily, there’s one simple trick that can help, according to a professional chef.
Cristian Feher, a chef and food expert who runs the YouTube channel Food Chain TV, says the secret lies in the top of the fruit. “First, you find one with a stem,” he said. “Then you take the stem off and if that little hole is nice and bright green then there’s a 99% chance that your avocado will be nice and green on the inside.”
However, if the spot under the stem looks brown, you might want to avoid it.
“If that little hole has brown spots then there’s like a 50% chance that your avocado will have brown spots on the inside,” Feher explained.
“So just to be safe, only buy avocados that have a nice clean green belly button.”
In his video titled ‘How to choose a ripe avocado’, Feher walks viewers through everything they need to know, including how to pick the perfect one using colour and feel.
“Choosing an avocado is actually really easy if you know what you’re looking for,” he said.
“Avocados that are not ripe are going to be nice and bright green and as they ripen they’ll turn black. So a ripe avocado is dark in colour, it’s more black than it is green.”
Next comes the squeeze test. Feher recommends gently pressing the fruit to check how soft it is.
“You should just be able to press on it and make a nice little indentation,” he said.
“It’s going to be a little bit firm and a little bit soft. The more avocados you squeeze, the better you’ll get at this.”
He also warned against choosing avocados that are too soft, saying: “An overly ripe avocado is going to be really soft and you don’t want an overly ripe avocado.
“This is already past its prime and it’s already spoiled.”
In the video, Feher demonstrates the stem test by cutting open two avocados, one with a green stem hole, which turned out fresh inside, and one with brown at the top, which had a small bruise in the flesh.
“The stem end of the avocado showed us what it’s going to look like inside,” he said. “There’s no brown pieces and it’s nice and ripe and ready to eat.”
For anyone who wants to keep their avocados fresh for longer, there is one simple storage method.