PSA For Anyone Sticking Their Avocados In Water To Store Them: The FDA Says It’s Actually Not A Good Idea
It’s not exactly news that keeping avocados fresh is a pretty precarious process, and it’s like as soon as you get them home from the grocery store they’re just a few days away at best from being a questionable addition to guacamole or toast.
Well, leave it to social media to solve this mystery!
I’m sure you’ve seen this trend making its way around social media: people putting their avocados in water in order to store them for maximum freshness.
One woman even went viral on Facebook for sharing this hack, and she said in her post, “Avocado lovers sit down because I’m about to change your life.”
“Did y’all already know this?? Avocados stay good for-freaking-ever if you put them in water in the fridge.”
“These have been in here for two whole dang weeks while the control group on the countertop rotted. They’re perfect. I’m speechless.”
She later said in an update to her post that she left one avocado underwater for an entire month (yes, 4 weeks) and it still was in “perfect” condition.
It seems like a pretty good way to hack the ripeness and perfection of your avocados, but apparently, it’s not the best thing to be doing.
A spokesperson for the FDA spoke to Today recently about this, saying, “The FDA does not recommend this practice.”
jchizhe – stock.adobe.com
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“The main concern is with the possibility that any residual human pathogens (i.e. Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella spp., etc.) that may be residing on the avocado surface, may potentially multiply during the storage when submerged in water.”
The most concerning thing about Listeria is that it is able to multiply right in your fridge, which the majority of other bacteria aren’t able to do.
“So if you unknowingly refrigerate Listeria-contaminated food, the germs not only multiply at the cool temperature, they could contaminate your refrigerator and spread to other foods there, increasing the likelihood that you and your family will become sick,” the FDA said on their website.
So what’s the best thing to do with your avocados? The FDA recommends scrubbing your avocados with a “clean produce brush” before storing them anywhere in your kitchen.
At the end of the day, it’s probably best to just stick your avocados in the fridge after all and skip out on their water bath!
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