You’ve just bought 2-3 fresh tomatoes at the local market. They were stored open air with no refrigeration. You’re in your kitchen putting away your food. Do you put them in the refrigerator?
Also, will they stay fresh longer if you refrigerate them?
( I know that I have strong opinions on this subject and I know how they were handled in my kitchen growing up. I want to ask this question with an open mind to see if I am being unreasonable and/or flat out wrong. )
Are they fully ripe?
They are better if you don’t refrigerate them, but they will last longer if you do.
If you are going to use them in the next few days, don’t refrigerate them. If it’s going to be longer, you will lose quality, but at least they won’t have started rotting if you refrigerate them.
Best is if you find a cool space, in the 50ish degree range. That gives the best balance of quality and longevity. Many commissaries and some restaurants have a walk in area that is kept at these temps for just that reason.
OTOH, if you buy them not fully ripened, they will last longer at room temperature, but then obviously you can’t use them immediately.
And keep ripe tomatoes away from bananas.
Yes, they are fully ripe at the time of purchase.
This is my experience, too.
The same is true of fresh-picked strawberries. But they only last about a day unrefrigerated, so if you buy them at a supermarket, they’ve already been chilled and there’s no further reduction in quality.
Also: is there any way to stop the moisture ‘bloating’ if they are refrigerated? Or is it best at that point to just throw them out?
I was going to come in and explain tomato storage, but @k9bfriender has it right in the post I quoted a bit of above (the rest of that post is also both useful and correct; though I’d keep them just above 55º if possible, and do have a cooler I can set to that temperature for tomatoes, eggplant, and some other things.)
Strawberries, unlike tomatoes, won’t ripen further after harvest. Those green-tipped strawberries you might see in the store? They’re not ripe, and they’ll never be ripe (though they will eventually soften and rot.)
Thanks, it’s been forever since I’ve been in the culinary scene at this point. I knew the optimal temp was in the 50’s, I just couldn’t remember exactly what it was.
For a long time, we routinely refrigerated tomatoes.
Then I started keeping them at room temperature. There may be a mild improvement in flavor. I haven’t noticed them going bad at a significantly faster rate than when refrigerated.
Interesting - do you know why this is? What’s the difference between the ripening processes?
It’s not about ripening. Fresh strawberries lose some of their “punch” if you refrigerate them. Back when we used to go to pyo strawberries places, i learned not to refrigerate any that i planned to eat or cook the same day.
I don’t know the technicalities of how the process works; but berries generally don’t, while most tree fruit, melons, and many vegetables will. I don’t know all the exceptions – only what I generally work with.
I do know that, even for the crops which will ripen after harvest, they have to have reached a certain degree of ripeness on the plant in order to develop full flavor after harvest; if they’re taken too unripe, they may soften and even develop color but never develop much flavor.
I’ve gotten very good flavor on strawberries that had been refrigerated before I took them to market – but will have to run a taste test on that later this spring. I’ll probably forget what thread the discussion was in, though!
I used to get really excellent earliglow strawberries from the WTC farmer’s market back in the day. I’m sure they had been refrigerated. But when we picked our own strawberries we noticed a difference. Not the the refrigerated ones weren’t good, just not quite as excellent.
Earliglow’s one of the varieties I grow. They’re very good. Not as good as Sparkle, though.
They’re both too soft for shipping, and small by modern standards. But that’s how you get the flavor.
I’ve read good things about Sparkle, but never tried it. Alas, i can’t grow strawberries here, every critter eats them as soon as the berries start to turn white. I sometimes get a few alpine berries, but I’ve never successful in ripening a regular strawberry. Earliglow is a fabulous berry, and i look for it in season.
I don’t refrigerate tomatoes or berries.
This is us. But if we buy tomatoes, we typically eat them within a few days.
Although, speaking of tomatoes, I still have fond memories of eating fresh garden tomatoes in Ohio (in particular, in Reynoldsburg – Home of the Beefsteak Tomato).
Hmmm, point of fact, tomatoes are berries, but strawberries aren’t.
Point in fact, the botanical definition of “berry” is even more out of sync with the culinary definition than the botanical definition of “fruit” is.
I know, it was originally strawberries I figured I’d lob a slow pitch for someone to point it out.