Avocado roulette anyone?! 🥑

[octonuddle]

What are your top tips for consistently picking edible avocados at the supermarket? I’m sick of opening them to either find they are rock solid or brown sludge. My success rate is about one in four which makes it very expensive and creates lots of waste ☹️. Every time I actually open one that is edible I feel like I’ve won the lottery!

Anyone willing to share their secret to avocado success?!

Buy the reduced ones - they’re always ready

Alternatively - banana trick

It’s so disappointing isn’t it?

are the hass ones the dark green knobbly ones or the brighter green shiny ones? a garden centre near me sells the bright green ones, they are much more consistently good and much bigger.

I have to hold them up to my ear to gently squeeze as I find I can tell better when I can hear if they are ripe I know, I’m weird .

recently I’ve noticed a lot more of them (green knobbly ones from supermarkets) feel good but inside they have very fine brown ‘veins’ which I have never really noticed before.

I find the solution to the avocado problem is to throw money at it, and now If I’m passing a sainsburys or an M&S I buy one that’s perfectly ripe and eat that day. Otherwise I don’t bother. I spend my money on those super posh expensive cherry tomatoes instead as they are consistently delicious and never let me down

I've had good results with M&S avocados in a paper bag with an apple for about 10 days.

Thought I'd cracked the method so tried it with Aldi one, but that went from rock hard to black mush with no edible period in between. We buy about 70% of our shopping from Aldi so I'm not an 'Aldi is shit' person.

M&S quite often have them on their 'produce super 6' section so reasonable price too.

Oh god I gave up getting them on delivery. I use Sainsburys Chop Chop app, and every single time they arrive rotten. You now when you gently poke the skin and your finger sinks in? 🤢

I got refunded every time but after the third time I realised I need to buy them myself.

Squeeze the avocado gently lengthwise with two fingers; ie with your forefinger pressing the top where the stalk is, and your thumb at the bottom. If it's slightly squishy it's ripe (Jamie Oliver tip)

Oh and if you get a hard avocado, put it in a brown paper bag with a banana to ripen quickly!

Well today was a lottery win! It’s fair made my day. If I were to have any criticism I’d say maybe one day off perfection as there was a little more firmness than ideal…however it tasted great and didn’t impact my enjoyment. Roll on tomorrow. I’m hoping I’ve not peaked on day 1.

Lidl do nice small one person sized avocados and I've always been OK with those.

I've just had another thought, that perhaps my R&R from Ocado are nearly always perfect because they aren't in a supermarket being squeezed and bruised by customers, but in a warehouse. They also come in a little cardboard tray which protects them further.

OP, glad you won today! Looking forward to your further reports.

Mine was very disappointing today! Slightly squishy, felt great. But inside there were brown veins in places, and a tough area as well. Do apples affect them inconsistently, perhaps, if they are in the same fruit bowl?

Avocado number 2….felt quite firm to the touch so was expecting it to be quite hard - was surprised to see some browning. Definitely edible which is good, but not what I was expecting…mild feeling of disappointment upon opening given appearance, but grateful it was edible.

@octonuddle How was it this morning? (I just opened yet another perfect Peruvian M&S R&R.)

@hedgehoglurker hi! Thanks for asking…it was perfection 😊. I took the photo with my work phone however and it is encrypted so I cant upload it here so here’s a photo of a photo of said perfect avocado. I’m already exceeding all expectations and making myself a liar with the 25% hit rate…currently at 75% success….

I buy a ripe and ready most weeks on my Tesco delivery so don’t get to choose it. It lives in the fridge for 2-5 days before I’m ready to use it and they’re always fine.

Maybe I have really low standards!

I sometimes order from crowdfarming when avocados are in season. they are all perfect avocados when ripe, have a great flavour and there is no waste. On the downside, some can be very small, it depends on the farmer, so the ratio of avocado to stone and skin can be disappointing, and you do have a lot of avocados being perfectly ripe at the same time. We usually have Mexican feast on these days.

You could do what my MP did and employ someone to do avocado rotation.

Waitrose always used to be the one reliable source of perfect avocados but the strike rate has plummeted of late. Nasty, gritty, bruised. I'm conscious of what a hideously first world problem 'disappointing avocados' is, so have decided to step away from it and focus instead on pears. The fruit with the ten-minute ripeness window.

I've actually taken them off my regular Ocado order as I'm just so pissed off with inedible ones. I don't think they tolerate being delivered very well, and only now buy them if I'm in store. And I love the buggers so it's very upsetting

I had a pack of 4 last time and not one was edible.

Day 4s offering…disappointing…quite brown and soggy…I’ve chopped it up and shoved it in my salad anyway with some lemon juice to stop it getting worse but I’m not looking forward to lunch today :( …if I’d had another, I’d have chucked it and taken a punt on the other. So…inconclusive…do we consider this a pass? Or a fail?