21 February

I don’t like over-ripe fruit. I like fruit to be firm, even crunchy (like a good crunchy pear). Eating a super-ripe piece that dribbles down your chin - gross. The same for bananas, once they start to get really ripe and soft, yuk. I like them just on the cusp of ripeness, still a bit firm. And yellow peaches at that same firm ripeness are heaven. Who refrigerates bananas? I find (the South Korean example I posted the other day) that you buy a bunch and by the time you get to the second half of it the banana is soft and mushy and gross. So now I refrigerate one half of every bunch I buy, if the shop only has bananas of similar ripeness. It makes the skin go brown or black, but the fruit stays firm. (Some people refrigerate in containers without the skin for that reason.) Over-ripe fruit is also chock full of sugar. Fruits in our history were generally much lower in sugar than what we eat now. Crab apples, some may remember.