Imagine biting into a crisp apple on New Year’s Day or savoring home-cooked soup brimming with sweet local squash in the middle of a February freeze. It can happen if you know how to store your fall produce correctly.
Rachel Wandrei works with a locally grown program within the Minnesota Department of Agriculture. She tells us how to get the most out of our fall bounty, whether we grew it ourselves or picked it up at an orchard, patch, or farmers market. And guess what? It doesn’t take elbow grease!
Your Refrigerator’s Secret Weapon
Wait to wash your fruits and veggies until just before use. Produce is sensitive to water. The outer skin of fruits and vegetables protects them, but moisture can weaken this protective layer, allowing bacteria to grow.
Use crisper drawer settings to create the right humidity conditions to keep produce longer. These special drawers control humidity by adjusting airflow. Different fall products have different preferred humidity levels, so we suggest setting one drawer to “high” (closed vents) and the other to “moderate” or “low” (more open vents). The high humidity setting traps more moisture inside by reducing airflow while the low humidity setting allows more airflow, creating a drier storage space.
Apples can last up to seven months, depending on the variety. They store best in cold, high humidity conditions. Keep your apples in a paper bag in the high-humidity drawer in your fridge. You can even wrap each apple individually in paper before storing. If one apple starts to go soft, the paper wrapping will prevent it from affecting the rest of your stash.
Onions can last up to four months with proper storage. Keep them whole with the peel on in the low-humidity crisper drawer of your fridge for maximum storage length. If your crisper drawer is overflowing, cured onions with peels on also love a good dry, cool basement spot. Hang in mesh bags (or clean pantyhose) in a dark spot with plenty of air flow. If you notice green shoots sprouting from your onions, don’t worry. Both the onion and the green shoots are safe to eat. You can cut the green sprouts and use them like green onions.
No Cellar? No Problem.
If your basement tends to be cool and dry, it can be an ideal spot for storing garlic, onions, and winter squash. These crops prefer dark, cool, dry conditions with good airflow. Find an inside nook away from outer windows and moisture sources. Hang products in wide mesh bags or stack in open crates with plenty of room to breathe.
Whole bulbs of garlic, in their skins, can last up to six months in storage at a cooler temperature. Those same bulbs can last up to two months at room temperature. If your garlic begins to shrivel or sprout, it’s still safe to eat, but it’s no longer at peak quality.
Winter squash stores up to six months, depending on the variety:
- Acorn: up to two months
- Butternut: up to three months
- Hubbard: up to six months
- Pumpkin: up to three months
- Spaghetti: up to two months
Learn more: https://minnesotagrown.com/pick-of-the-month/storage-tips-for-stocking-up-on-minnesotas-fall-produce/