Learn more about ‘What Is The Fastest Way To Ripen An Avocado?’ When an avocado is put to a salad, eggs, or our favorite avocado toast, there is nothing quite like biting into a creamy avocado. It might be quite annoying to want—no, need—your avocado fix right now but the one you have on hand is rock-hard and unable to be cut, despite how great it is to consume this fruit.
You can play the waiting game until your fruit is soft enough to be consumed if your avocados need to hasten the ripening process. Who, though, has the time for that?
Thankfully, if your avocado isn’t quite ripe but you’re ready to consume it, there is a certain approach to help move things along in the ripening department.
How Do Avocados Ripen?
Avocados do not ripen until they are harvested, in contrast to many other fruits that are produced on trees. After being harvested, underripe avocados often still have a light or bright green shell and are extremely firm to the touch.
When the skin of your avocados turns a darker green, they are ripe and ready to be eaten. Avocados also become softer as they mature. As a result, the avocado submits to firm, mild pressure without becoming mushy when you place it in your palm and squeeze it. Your avocado may be approaching overripeness if the outside of the fruit is quite dark and the flesh feels very mushy when you squeeze it. Grab your knife and start cutting right immediately in this situation! Take advantage of your avocado’s lasting quality while it’s still available because it’s still delectably ripe. Otherwise, it will soon become bad.
How Do You Quickly Ripen An Avocado?
Understandably, if you are determined to eat an avocado but it is not yet ripe enough to consume, you may have questioned how you may hasten the ripening process to fit your schedule. When time is of the essence, you’ll be happy to learn that there is a way to ripen your avocado. We talked to Amanda Izquierdo, MPH, RD, LDN, a registered dietitian who also works for the Hass Avocado Board, supporting programs like its science-based food and wellness education campaign, Love One Today, to learn more about the best way to hasten the ripening of avocados.
Izquierdo says that putting an unripe avocado in a brown paper bag with an apple or banana for two to three days can cause it to ripen quickly and easily. She goes into greater detail about this unanticipated trick, including how it works and why it’s so successful at speeding up the ripening of your avocados.
She continues, “This method functions because of a plant hormone called ethylene, which naturally occurs in fruits like apples and bananas. “Ethylene starts the ripening process, and when these fruits are put together in a brown paper bag, the ethylene gases created by them get trapped and accelerate the ripening process for the combined fruits.”
Therefore, accelerating the ripening of avocados doesn’t require any elaborate devices or difficult recipes. You only need to put an apple or a banana with the rest of your produce in a paper bag.
Thanks to this simple yet effective technique, eating your favorite avocado recipes is no longer restricted by an underripe avocado.
