Effective Hacks For Extending Your Groceries’ Shelf Life

If you are someone who likes to cook and values having produce that is as fresh as possible, you will inevitably run into frustrating moments when you find that something you made or bought has gone bad. This will get on your nerves on two levels, knowing that your food has gone to waste and also having to come up with something else to eat on the spot. 

While there is no magical way to counteract the passage of time that will naturally cause food to go bad, there are all sorts of tricks that you can apply to specific food items to make them last a little longer than you previously thought. Read on for four great hacks to extend the shelf life of your groceries.

See If Your Eggs Float, And Store Them Properly In Salt

It can be good advice to say “when in doubt, throw it out,” as the cost of a little waste is mild in comparison to the cost of getting food poisoning. WIth that in mind, many people throw anything away that is past its expiry day, and while that is a decent rule of thumb, there are many things that can last longer than the packages say. Eggs are an example  of that, but you should test them to find out whether they are past their date or you don’t know when they were from.

To test your eggs, see if your eggs will float in water. Floating eggs indicate that the air in the eggs has expanded, which suggests they are now too old. That’s always a drag to find out, but to make your eggs last longer you can keep them in a container full of salt and keep it in a cool, dark place. However, you don’t want them to freeze, as they will then rot faster. Eggs stored properly in salt at the right temperature can actually last over eight months!

Use A Slice Of Bread To Bring Stale Foods Back To Freshness

There are two facts of life that we all must accept at some point or another. One is that everybody must grow old and eventually pass away, and another is that breads, cakes, cookies, and other baked goods must grow stale. While humans have yet to solve the puzzle of aging in ourselves, we have found a way to reverse the process of stale food items. We do this by putting a slice of fresh bread in the container with the goods that have gone stale.

As if by osmosis, you will find that within a day the bread will become hard but the previously hard items will be brought back to an earlier point of freshness. Dry, stale cookies for example, will become soft and delicious as they take the moisture that was in the fresh bread, like a vampire sucking blood from a person to fuel their own eternal youth.

Use Lemon As A Natural Preservative

You may notice that many packaged foods contain an ingredient called “citric acid.” This acts as a preservative, keeping the food fresher for longer. And what natural ingredient contains citric acid? Lemon juice. By adding lemon juice to foods, it will make them last longer, even foods that are famous for going bad shortly after you cut them, such as avocado.

In the case of avocado, finding a way to make it last longer is incredibly helpful because avocados are quite expensive and also very filling, meaning it is common for one to only eat half of them. Even in the fridge, though, they grow brown rapidly, so one that you open at lunch will have gone bad by dinner. That’s where lemon juice comes in. Run some lemon juice onto the open area, and the ascorbic acid in avocados will be neutralized by the lemon’s high pH. The oxygen will still react with the avocado, but this should buy you a day or so of a fresh avocado in the fridge.

Put A Ripe Apple Into Your Potato Bag

You may know that ripe apples give off ethylene gas, which expedites the ripening of other food around it. This can be a good thing, such as bringing an unripe food to ripeness, but it can also be a bad thing, as foods that are well ripened will quickly go bad in the presence of the ethylene. This is where the phrase “the bad apple spoils the bunch” comes from. 

Surprisingly, the ethylene in ripe apples can also be beneficial to potatoes in inhibiting the sprouting process. As you do not want your potatoes to sprout, this makes it a good idea to put an apple into your potato bag. You also want it to be in a moisture-free environment that is cool and dry, so be mindful of where you store them.