I usually eat ½ an avocado with my breakfast each morning. Mom eats the other half. This morning as Mom was eating hers, she commented how the avocados I give her are always so delicious. She asked me how I did it
Fact is, we never throw avocados away anymore. I buy avocados once a week, and they last a week.
For years I have been told to put avocados in a paper sack and put in a cool dark place, and they will quickly ripen. True, but you also need to eat them up quick, or mash them into guacamole. If you want to eat one a day for a week, the paper sack trick will leave you with overripe fruit.
First and foremost—avoid those smooth skin avocados. I’ve found them to be rather watery and tasteless, no matter how ripe they get. For me, Hass avocado is the best.
Shopping for the perfect avocado is easy. In fact, I don’t even do my own grocery shopping anymore. I go online and place my order at Smiths, and then we pick it up the next day. Lazy? Maybe. But efficient and a tremendous time saver.
When ordering my avocados, I always include one comment. “Hard please.” Yep, when shopping avocados, I go for the hardest, without any give. Now, if you are shopping for avocados for that day, then you will want to select fruit with a slight give—not too overly soft. But for me, I am shopping for the upcoming week, and normally have one or two avocados from last shopping day ready to eat.
After I get my HARD avocados home, I place them in a bowl on the counter. I don’t put them in a paper sack or in a dark place.
The next day, I check the avocados. If they have a slight give, they all go in the refrigerator. If they are still rock hard, I let them sit out one more day.
And that is it. Once in the refrigerator they pretty much stop ripening, and I have delicious avocados for the rest of the week.