Everybody loves an avocado; these are considered a great snack, a delicious lunch option, and an ultra-healthy way to get some valuable fats and nutrients while enjoying their velvety texture and unique, decidedly “green” flavor!
However, a hard avocado is not to anybody’s taste, so what do you do if your avocado won’t ripen?
Avocados are usually hard because they simply aren’t ripe enough yet, and usually, you can just wait and they’ll eventually ripen. However, some avocados go straight from rock-hard to brown and unappetizing, and that’s usually because they were picked too early from the tree. Alternatively, they may have been stored in a very cold environment.
Let’s find out all about what stops avocados from ripening, and how you can pick consistently good avocados!
Reason 1: It’s Too Soon
If you’ve got an unripe avocado from the store, you might just be a little too impatient.
It can take up to seven days for an avocado to ripen, even at room temperature (which is the recommended temperature for storing an unripe avocado).
The fruit needs time to soften, and if you’re overly keen to eat it, it might seem like it’s never going to get there.
Some fruits will be ready at the point of purchase and some will only take a couple of days to soften, so bear this in mind when you’re selecting your avocados and assessing their ripeness.
The harder an avocado is when you buy it, the longer you’ll have to wait to eat it.
Reason 2: It Was Picked Too Early
Although most of the produce you buy in a supermarket will probably ripen fine at home, you do get avocados that never really turn ripe.
Instead, they go from solid to mush, with no good stage in between. You aren’t imagining this – it’s a real thing that avocados do.
It often happens because the avocado was harvested too early. Avocados need to stay on the tree long enough for oils to form inside the fruit, and these oils help it to soften and become ripe.
An avocado that was picked too early doesn’t have much hope of ever becoming good to eat!
Reason 3: It’s Been Stored Too Cold
Many grocery stores use cold storage to prevent spoilage in their foods, and fruits like avocados are often chilled during shipping.
If this has happened, there is a chance that the avocado won’t ripen, and will instead start to rot once it has been removed from cold storage.
That’s another reason that it’s important for you not to put avocados in the fridge while you’re waiting for them to ripen.
Avocados should be stored at room temperature. If you chill the fruit, you may find that it never softens properly. An avocado that is ripe can be put in the fridge to slow down the ripening process, but you should never chill an unripe avocado.
What Can You Do?
It’s frustrating to have an avocado that simply won’t ripen.
You don’t want to cut it too early, because hard avocados are objectively unpleasant.
They won’t mash, they won’t slice, and they lack that delicious, buttery texture that is so sought-after. There are a few solutions that you can look at, fortunately.
One is to purchase avocados that are ripe or almost ripe in the store, as these will continue to ripen at home. You can test by gently pressing your thumb against the stem of the avocado. If the flesh here is reasonably soft, the avocado is almost ready to eat. These avocados will finish ripening at home without an issue.
If you’ve already bought the avocado, though, that’s not much help, but there are still a few tricks you can try.
To begin with, place the avocado in a paper bag next to an apple or a banana. These fruits release ethylene gas, which encourages ripening and will help it along the way.
Storing an avocado in the sun can also help, perhaps surprisingly.
Simply set the fruit on a sunny windowsill and wait for a couple of days, and you should find that it has softened beautifully. Warmer temperatures will encourage ripening, so keep your kitchen reasonably warm too.
Neither of these tricks will completely overcome the problem of an avocado that was picked too early, but they can help, so give them a try if you’re frustrated by a fruit that seems to stay hard day after day.
Conclusion
Nobody wants to eat an avocado that is hard and flavorless, but if yours won’t ripen at home, it’s possible that you’re either impatient, or the fruit was picked too early.
In some places, rules govern how early an avocado can be taken from the tree, but this isn’t the case everywhere.
Look out for soft, tender avocados when buying to maximize your chances of getting one that will ripen well.
Editor’s note: The content on this website is meant to be informative, but it should not be taken as medical advice. The content of our articles is not intended for use in the diagnosis, prevention, and/or treatment of health problems. It’s always best to speak with your doctor or a certified medical professional before making any changes to your lifestyle, diet, exercise routine, or trying a new supplement.
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