How to choose an avocado How to choose a ripe avocado in the store - simple recommendations

Victoria from Volgograd

The family loves salads with avocados. How to choose the right fruit in the store so that it is ripe?

Exotic avocado is a very tasty fruit if you choose it correctly. Determining its ripeness is not at all difficult, knowing some rules. If you still bought a green fruit, do not worry. It can be allowed to ripen at home.

Skin color

Not knowing how to determine the ripeness of an avocado, many first of all evaluate its appearance and choose fruits with a brown skin. This is fundamentally wrong. The color of the skin and the shape of an avocado can reveal its variety and signal spoilage. In our stores you can find three varieties of this fruit:

Advice. Choose fruit that does not show signs of spoilage (cuts, dents, mold).

Fruit firmness

You can determine the ripeness of an avocado by tactile sensations, namely, by evaluating its hardness.
Take the fruit in your hands and, without much effort, press your finger on the peel. The result of pressing will tell you about the ripeness of the avocado:

• the avocado is firm, there is no dent when pressed - the fruit is unripe, the flesh will be bitter and unpleasant in taste;
• “porridge” is felt inside, a deep dent is a signal that the avocado is overripe and most likely rotted inside;

By the firmness of the fruit, you can determine the degree of its ripeness

• when pressed, a dent formed and quickly went wrong - you have in your hands a perfectly ripe avocado with the best taste properties.

Advice. Don't go overboard with pressing the avocado. If the fruit is overripe, it may burst right in your hands. Why are you in trouble at the store?

The stone and the stalk will tell about ripeness

In a ripe avocado, the stone inside exfoliates from the pulp, and in green - fused with it. Hold the fruit to your ear and shake it. If you hear the tapping of the stone, do not hesitate, the avocado is ripe. Silence in response? Let this fruit ripen.

Fruit of optimal ripeness (left) and overripe (right)

The color of the place under the stalk is an indicator of the ripeness of the avocado:

• brown - the avocado is already overripe;
• with yellowness - it is still too early to eat fruit;
• bright green - here it is, the ideal exotic pulp. If fresh juice acts as a bonus to the color under the stalk, feel free to buy fruit.

Ripening at home

Sometimes it happens that through negligence or intentionally I had to buy an unripe avocado. Do not despair. It can be allowed to ripen at home.

Avocados will ripen well in a paper bag

Wrap the fruit in plain paper (paper towel) and leave it in the room. In 3-4 days he will "reach". If you want to speed up ripening, wrap bananas in avocado paper.

Advice. Do not put avocados in the refrigerator to ripen. This will only spoil it.

It is better to store a ripe avocado in the vegetable compartment of the refrigerator, after wrapping it in paper. It will not last longer than two weeks, consider this when purchasing.

Avocado is a dietary and very healthy fruit with an unusual taste. You already know how to choose an avocado. Use our tips to not throw money away.

How to choose an avocado: video

The second common name for an avocado is an alligator pear. The unusual "vegetable" taste of this fruit makes it an ideal ingredient for salads, pastas and various snacks. The fatty acids contained in avocados, potassium, copper, iron, riboflavin improve the general condition of the body, normalize the functioning of the cardiovascular and digestive systems. But in order to fully enjoy the taste of the fruit, as well as get your "dose" of benefits from it, you need to know how to choose an avocado. What criteria should be followed when buying?

Ripe avocado: how to choose by color

One of the main criteria, focusing on which you can buy a ripe fruit, is the color of its peel. The following points must be taken into account:

1. A light green skin indicates that the avocado is still quite immature. If you place it on the windowsill, then in about five days the fruit will ripen.
2. The peel of a moderately green color also serves as an argument against the purchase: such an avocado will ripen only on the third or fourth day after purchase.
3. Saturated green is a good choice. A fruit with this skin color is almost ripe. Its full taste will be revealed in 24 hours.
4. A dark green color approaching brown means that the avocado has already had time to fully ripen. A fruit with such a peel can be eaten immediately, without waiting until it ripens.
5. A very dark skin color (green, almost completely turned into brown) indicates that the avocado is overripe. In this case, the taste of the fruit will no longer be able to “boast” those shades for which avocados are so valued. Naturally, if we are not talking about the Haas variety: it is characterized by a very dark, almost black peel.

There is another little trick to pinpointing a ripe avocado. You need to remove the stalk from the fruit you like and check what color is under it. If it is bright green with brownish veins, then you can complete your “research” and return home to prepare a salad. A yellow-green or dark brown (brownish) hue clearly indicates an unripe or overripe avocado, respectively - you will have to keep looking.

It is bad if the skin of the fetus is covered with an excessive amount of black spots. A “healthy” fruit may have only one small speck, otherwise the “marks” clearly indicate damage to the avocado.

How to choose the right avocado by touch

A good fruit is almost impossible to buy, only by visually evaluating it. So, you have to literally take matters into your own hands. The ripeness of an avocado is determined by:

• when pressed, the fetus gives in a little, but as soon as the pressure stops, the dent quickly disappears;
• you can clearly hear the tapping of the stone inside the avocado if you shake the fruit near your ear;
• when you click on the trace from the handle, juice is slightly released through it.

Very hard fruits that do not respond to pressure and do not “sound” when shaken should be avoided. These "stone-like" avocados have not yet matured enough to be used in cooking. In the absence of a choice (after all, ripe fruits are often simply not available in stores), unripe fruit should be purchased. You can help him “grow up”: for this you need to put the avocado in a paper bag or simply wrap it in paper and place it in a dark, dry place where room temperature is stably maintained. The shelf life depends on the degree of initial “readiness” of the fetus.

Bad and inflection in the other direction. If the avocado you like is too pliable and it seems that mushy pulp is hidden under the skin of the fruit, then such a fruit has long been overripe. In especially “neglected” cases, you can even accidentally crush a too ripe fruit (therefore, it is better to behave moderately “restrainedly” in relation to avocados).

How to choose an avocado in the store: the most delicious variety

Most often, domestic buyers are offered the following varieties of avocados:

1. Florida. Mostly found on the shelves in winter. The rind of the fruit is poorly removed, during cleaning, the pulp suitable for food is also partially removed. Avocados have an unusually sweet flavor that makes them not suitable for most salads. But the Florida variety is considered the least high-calorie.
2. Pinkerton. The most common variety. It cleans well and has a good taste, which makes it indispensable during culinary experiments.
3. Californian, or Haas. This variety is often confused with Pinkerton, but it is quite easy to distinguish them by the peel: in Haas, it is much darker, rather close to brown in color. The fruit itself has a rounded shape, and its pulp is characterized by a high degree of suppleness.

The tastiest variety of avocado is haas. But it is almost impossible to buy this fruit ripe: due to the excessive softness of the fruit, it is difficult to transport it, so unripe “representatives” are usually present in stores.

Pinkerton is probably the best option. It has a small bone, and its peel is easily removed without affecting the pulp. In addition, the fruit is suitable for preparing the most common avocado dishes - rolls and salads.

Worst of all things are in the Florida variety. It is considered the most tasteless and uneconomical: due to the large stone and the inability to remove the peel without pulp, a significant part of the paid weight ends up in the bin.

Avocado is a very controversial fruit. Many begin to spit as soon as they hear about it: the whole point is that few people have ever tasted a ripe fruit. But now you know how to choose the right ripened avocado.

I am always perplexed - in our stores, avocado fruits are sold mostly unfit for consumption. But someone is buying up these mountains of avocados!

1. In the store: Lightly press the avocado with your fingers. It should be slightly soft. Very hard avocados are often sold - they have pulp like wood, this is not at all the same. The avocado should not be rotten, not have transparent semi-liquid spots on the skin, but it should be soft - slightly succumb to the finger like a ripe peach.

2. Peel the avocado: cut it in half, cutting through to the bone.
Can be cut into quarters. Gently break into cuts, remove parts from the bone - they are removed easily if you bought a RIPE avocado fruit. Throw away the bone. Remove the skin from an avocado - it is removed very easily and completely if you bought a RIPE avocado fruit.

The pulp of a truly ripe avocado fruit is simply wonderful - soft, oily, with a light, fresh, unique aroma. Avocado, like cucumber, has a neutral taste, only in cucumber it is watery-fresh, and in avocado it is oily-fresh.

Avocados, like cucumbers, go well with soft white salted cream cheese or white soft salted cheese spread. You can put such cheese on bread, on top of a slice of avocado pulp - this is the food of the gods!

Like cucumber, avocado pairs well with shrimp and other seafood.

Try simple salad: mix peeled boiled and cooled king prawns with avocado slices and chopped lettuce, pour over with pink sauce (pink sauce: mayonnaise + ketchup in a ratio of 50:50).

Avocado is good to cook sauces for salads and hot, whipping its pulp in a blender with 10% cream and various flavorings - spices, seasonings, fried mushrooms, tomatoes, olives, etc.

stuffed avocado- do not throw away the avocado skin halves, prepare a salad using the avocado pulp and other finely chopped ingredients - and fill the avocado skin halves with this salad. Top with greens and chopped egg.

Enjoy the tasty and healthy avocado fruit!

The exotic fruit avocado is recognized as the most nutritious fruit, for which he was honored with a mention in the Guinness Book of Records. It contains so many vitamins and minerals that it has become referred to as a super food. But they fell in love with the overseas fruit not only for its benefits, but also for its unique taste and aroma. To some it resembles nuts, to others spicy herbs, to others it resembles pine needles. If you haven't tried avocado yet, you should definitely do so.

How to choose a really ripe fruit in order to feel the whole rich palette of taste. Consider the main features that distinguish a really ripe fruit, as well as other nuances of choosing an avocado.

Peculiarities

This exotic fruit, which grows on Perseus americana trees, can look different: have an oval, spherical or pear-shaped shape. The shades of the peel are different and depend on the place of growth: from pale green to almost black. In the section, a stone is visible, which can occupy about half of the entire fruit, and light yellow pulp of an oily texture.

There are three groups into which all avocados are divided: Mexican, Guatemalan, West Indian. Of the 400 varieties of this exotic fruit, only three varieties are usually found on the shelves of our country: "California", "Florida" and "Pinkerton". The first one represents the Guatemalan group. These are the same almost black Haas avocados with very soft and oily contents.

In addition to being used as a sandwich butter on its own, Haas works well in sauces, soups, and smoothies. As a rule, the fruits of this variety go on sale hard, otherwise they will quickly deteriorate.

"Haas"

"Florida" variety or "Hall" refers to the West Indian group. It often rains in its homeland, so such fruits have a fresher, sweeter taste, and the pulp is more watery. Smooth, light green, they are difficult to peel, have a medium-sized kernel, and the percentage of pulp in them is quite high. Hall's pulp does not fall apart when cut, so it is great for making rolls and salads. They are usually sold in winter.

"Pinkerton" in its properties is a cross between the other two varieties. Soups, smoothies, desserts are prepared from it. To some, its taste resembles meat, which is why it has gained popularity among vegetarians. The fruit is used instead of meat in various dishes. Important advantages of Pinkerton are its small bone and ease of cleaning; you can remove the peel from a ripe fruit with your hands.

"Pinkerton"

"Floridian"

How to choose?

As you have already learned, the choice of avocados largely depends on what kind of dish you want to cook from it. Different varieties have different properties. Now let's decide how to understand when buying a ripe fruit in front of us or not.

• The first thing to do is to press on the skin of the fruit. It should shrink a little, and then return to its original shape. If the fruit is unripe, then when pressed, the peel does not bend - it will need to be held for several days until ripening. On overripe fruits, on the contrary, dents remain.

• If you shake the fruit, you can hear the sound from the bone. If you didn’t hear anything like that, it means that the fruit is still too unripe or of poor quality.
• We determine the quality of the fruit in appearance. Examine the skin of the "alligator pear". It should have a uniform color without spots and dots. External damage is also undesirable.

Remember these simple rules - with the help of them you will choose only the most delicious avocados.

Finding a ripe, but not yet spoiled avocado is a great success. Most often, unripe specimens are on the shelves, so sellers insure themselves against losses, because ripe fruits quickly deteriorate. At home, they need to be kept in a cool place for a couple of days to let them ripen.

How ripe the fruit is in front of you will tell the pulp under the handle. Cut it off and look at its color. If the flesh inside is dark, then it is overripe, if there is black inside, it has deteriorated, if it is bright green, it has not ripened. The best color option is green with brown streaks.

Many do not try to check the condition of the fetus when they buy it, and even when they begin to clean it. The fact that the fruit is unripe becomes clear only in the process of eating. Too hard pulp and its bitter taste indicate that the fruit clearly has not reached the desired condition.

If the fruit looks elongated in place of the stalk, then it has ripened on the tree, in natural conditions, and will be very good. Eat it right away before it goes bad, and keep only unripe fruit for storage.

Here are a few more tricks that alligator pear lovers should know.

• When you see that the fruit should lie down for another day or two, but you want to eat or cook it right now, put it in the oven for a few minutes. So the pulp will become softer and tastier. Before that, cut it into large pieces, sprinkle with lemon so that it does not darken and salt.
• If you have a night to ripen, then there is such a simple way: put the avocado in a paper bag along with bananas. Apples and pears are also suitable. It is believed that they can accelerate maturation, since they release a gas - ethylene.

• How to store chopped fruit. Place the pieces in the refrigerator in an airtight container with half an onion to help preserve freshness and color. You can also rub them with lemon juice or apple cider vinegar. This will extend the life of the slices for at least a day. It is important not to store them in bowls of water - this will lead to rapid spoilage.
• Your avocado is overripe and no longer edible. Don't rush to throw it away. From the pulp you can make an excellent hair mask. Gather it up and distribute it through your hair with a sparse comb. After that, wash your hair thoroughly with shampoo.

What variety is on the diet?

For fans of a healthy lifestyle and even vegetarians, avocados are a valuable product. Even though it is a fruit, it contains a lot of protein. If we talk about people who are on a diet, then the overseas fruit becomes one of the products of choice for them. After all, adhering to a modest diet, they often receive less vitamins and nutrients.

Haas and Pinkerton are the most high-calorie - their nutritional value can reach 380 kcal per 100 grams of product. Despite the fact that all varieties of avocados have a low glycemic index (10 units), such a calorie content will not bring you closer to your goal - a lean body. Their Florida counterparts are best suited for dietary nutrition. Watery, tender and sweetish, they perfectly quench thirst and saturate the body with vitamins and microelements.

How to clean?

Usually avocados are cut lengthwise into two parts and the halves are turned in the opposite direction. After that, the bone is immediately removed from it, since it contains many toxins and, when interacting with air, they are actively released into the pulp of the fetus. A ripe specimen can be eaten directly from the resulting "boats" with a teaspoon.

Also, a ripe fruit can be peeled like this: make incisions on the halves that reach the peel, but do not pierce it through. After that, the halves are easily turned inside out, and the pulp is peeled off into a plate.

Unripe fruits, especially the Florida variety, cannot be peeled in this way - a potato peeler will help in the fight against a dense, stubborn peel. After this procedure, you can cut the fruit into pieces and use for cooking.

See the following video for how to peel and cut an avocado.

Recipes

Everyone has already heard about cold and warm salads with this exotic product. We bring to your attention a variant of a vegetarian olivier, unusual in content and design, which is served directly in avocado halves. It will help diversify your healthy menu and will come in handy during fasting, because it does not contain any meat or seafood. For its preparation, it is better to choose the "Florida" avocado.

Vegan Olivier

Ingredients:

• potatoes - 4 pcs.;
• carrots - 2 pcs.;
• pickled cucumbers - 2 pcs.;
• avocado - 2 pcs. (one for the sauce);
• canned peas - 100 g;
• onions - 1 pc.;
• apple - 1 pc.;
• salt and herbs to taste;
• lemon juice - 1 tbsp. l.;
• vegetable oil - 100 ml.

Finely chop boiled potatoes, carrots, as well as cucumber, onion and avocado. We cut the apple very finely. Sprinkle fruit with lemon juice to prevent browning. Mix them in a bowl and add peas. Now let's prepare the sauce.

After cutting the second avocado in half, remove all the pulp from it with a spoon, without damaging the skin. Put it in a blender, add salt and lemon juice, you can sweeten it with sugar a little and beat. Now add vegetable oil and repeat the procedure. Combine the ingredients with the resulting sauce and put the salad in the "boats" of the peel of the fruit.

Guacamole

Speaking of avocado dishes, one cannot ignore the sauce recipe, which is so popular in the homeland of this fruit - in Mexico. This guacamole is versatile and varied in composition. It is not difficult to prepare it, it is enough to stock up on ripe fruits. Guacamole is eaten with tortillas (corn tortillas), chips, crackers. In addition, it is an unusual side dish for meat and fish, sauce for mashed potatoes and pasta.

Ingredients:

• olive oil - 5 tbsp. l.;
• chili pepper - 2 pcs.;
• avocado - 6 pcs.;
• spices - to taste;
• shallots - 2 pcs.;
• lime - 2 pcs.;
• cilantro - 2 bunches.

Divide the avocado into two halves and scoop out the pulp with a spoon. Beat with a mixer until puree is formed. Remove the seeds from the chile and chop with a knife. Also finely chop the onion and herbs. Pour the lime juice into the resulting mass and combine it with olive oil and mix well.

An original, exquisite and beautiful appetizer - julienne in avocado. You can’t call this a dietary dish, but it is a great option for holidays and special occasions. You won't need much time to prepare it, but it will surely impress your household or guests.

Julienne with mushrooms and avocado

Ingredients:

• avocado - 1 pc.;
• champignons - 200 g;
• onion - 1 pc.;
• cream 20% - 150 ml;
• grated cheese and spices to taste.

Cut the fruit of medium ripeness into two "boats" and remove the core. Carefully scoop out the pulp with a small knife or spoon and mash lightly. Fry the onion, mushrooms and avocado contents in oil for 5 minutes, pour over the cream. Salt and pepper, leave the mass to languish over low heat for about 5 minutes.

It remains to put it all in halves, sprinkle with grated cheese and bake in the oven at 180 degrees. In 10 minutes, the exotic julienne will be ready.

Fat Burning Cocktail

It is very sweet but low in calories. All thanks to strawberries and honey - they make this drink as appetizing as a dessert. To keep slim, drink it instead of breakfast every morning.

Whatever your usual diet, exotic avocado will definitely help you to add variety to it. It can be light snacks, nutritious drinks and complex gastronomic masterpieces worthy of a restaurant menu. Choose the fruits of a suitable variety and degree of maturity, and feel free to start experimenting.

Avocado- the fruit is very tasty, but only if choose it correctly.

First of all, you need to pay attention to the degree of maturity of the fetus. An unripe avocado has an unpleasant bitter taste, its flesh is hard. A ripe, ripe avocado has a pleasantly sweet taste and a soft, buttery, almost creamy texture. The pulp of a particularly ripe fruit can even be spread on sandwiches like butter. How to determine the ripeness of an avocado and what other signs will help you choose the right delicious fruit?

Determining whether an avocado is ripe is very simple. You need to lightly press your fingers on the peel. If the fruit bends slightly under the fingers and then the dent quickly smoothes out, that is, the fruit is quite elastic, then this is the avocado you should choose. Another sign of a ripe avocado is the sound of the pit when shaking the fruit. Hold the avocado to your ear and shake it - if the stone knocks, then the avocado is ripe.

An unripe avocado will be firm to the touch and will not dent when pressed. His bone does not knock. However, such an avocado can also be bought, but it will have to be kept at home for several days at room temperature in order for it to ripen.

Too soft avocado, on which the dents are not smoothed out, is not worth taking. Such an avocado is overripe, and is more likely to be rotten inside.

Also pay attention to the appearance of the avocado, which can tell you a lot about the properties of the fruit.

Avocados can be green or brownish in color. The brownish-skinned avocado (pictured left) is a California variety. When ripe, it is very soft and is good for making avocado soup, smoothies, smoothies, or just spread on sandwiches. And if you cut such an avocado in half and take out the bone, you can scoop it out of the peel with a spoon and eat it right.

Ripe green-skinned avocados have firmer flesh and are suitable for making rolls and salads.

In the photo below, two avocados of different varieties - Florida (1) and Pinkerton (2). Click on photo to enlarge.

Please note that one of them (avocado 1) has a skin that looks thin and almost smooth, with barely noticeable pimples. The second avocado (in the photo at number 2) has a darker peel, all in large pimples. It is better to choose an avocado like number 2.

The peel of a number 2 avocado is dense and thick, it is easy to pick it up with a fingernail and completely peel the fruit without affecting the pulp.
On the contrary, an avocado of this type as number 1 can only be peeled with a knife, while inevitably removing the pulp layer along with the peel.

In addition, avocado 1 has a larger pit than avocado 2. In relation to the pulp, the pit occupies a very significant place in avocado 1, so it is more profitable to choose avocado 2 - for the same price you will get more pulp and less pit in relation to each other.