How Fresh is Fresh?
"Fresh" means different things to different people. How fresh is fresh?
I will share my thoughts on this topic by using strawberries as an exemplar. Not too far up the road from my office is a strawberry farm. Often, strawberry farms switch from commercial supply, where picking gangs are selecting the berries, to "Pick your own" modus towards the end of the season. This allows consumers direct access, and boy, the berries can't get any fresher than that. Straight from the plant into my mouth!
This strawberry grower has opted for a 'whole of summer approach' to the Pick Your Own concept!
By comparison, the commercially picked fruit, here in New Zealand, will typically take at least 18-24 hours before it sits on a supermarket strawberry display or in a green grocer's shop. Stores receive a 'fresh' delivery every day. The time the fruit takes to reach a store via a distribution centre or a wholesale market does not prevent the fruit from being offered as "fresh" when it goes on sale.
Yes, there are some provincial stores who might bypass the structured purchasing patterns offered by distribution centres and markets to get highly perishable produce, such as strawberries, directly delivered to their stores in considerable less time than 18 hours. But even so, the strawberries I pick myself and plop into my mouth are very much fresher indeed.
Strawberries - How Fresh is Fresh
It does not get much fresher than this. Row after row of punnets filled with ripe strawberries that shout 'pick any of us because we all taste good', at customers conditioned to expect fresh strawberries at their usual retail outlet.
It does not get any fresher than this? Well, the devil always is in the detail. I took this photo at an open air produce market in London some years ago. Punnets of strawberries sold without cover is an indication that the fruit might be 'fresher', i.e., harvested just a few hours before the seller turned up at the market to erect their stall.
Perception is, however, not always the same as reality. Strawberries are not harvested in the heat of day but in the mornings. The harvest crews are picking the fruit that has matured the previous day and whose temperature had naturally reduced over night. After harvest and sorting, the fruit is placed in a cooler in the afternoon where it will stay until the early hours of the next morning, when the grower or his agent/team member drives the fruit to the open air market of the grower's choice where the strawberries would then be sold as "fresh" strawberries. Without the speech marks, of course. So "fresh" in this instance means harvested in the morning of the day before and chilled for a while, before being put on offer at an open air market.
Fresh Strawberries in Supermarkets
Fresh strawberries for sale in supermarkets typically present differently to their 'cousins' whose fate is decided in the farmers market environment.
For starters, supermarket strawberries enjoy a more robust type of unit packaging. Most popular these day is the clamshell design. A container made entirely from (hopefully) recyclable plastic, with a hinged lid.
Supermarkets insist on their Stock Keeping Units (SKU) being scannable, which means each punnet of strawberries must feature a valid barcode that identifies the unit price of the punnet as it is passed over the scanner. (I will pick this entire supermarket sales system topic up in more detail in a future post.)
And being contained in solid punnets with a lid, means that strawberries destined for supermarket sales can be stacked 3-4 units high in a reusable transport crate. This also helps keep the distribution costs down.
Fresh Strawberries the Californian Way
All fresh produce is perishable. Strawberries are one of the most perishable fruits of the lot - and no, I do not want to enter a debate about whether strawberries are a fruit or not. If this matters to you visit the team at Cal Poly who put a neat little presentation together on this topic.
Californian strawberry growers have developed the concept of "fres" strawberries to a whole new level. They did not have a choice, quite frankly. California grows nearly 90% of theentire US strawberry crop!
Here is the link to a National Geographic article/documentary, which accompanies some of these fresh Califlornian strawberries from their paddocks on the Pacific coast to their markets on the Atlantic coast.
Please remember though, as interesting as the National Geographic contribution is, strawberries are just the exemplar. Think lettuce, think broccoli, think peaches and nectarines. All are crops that are grown in large volumes in California and are shipped to arrive in "fresh" condition in many East Coast locations.
What is the Meaning of Fresh then? then? As you can see, it really depends. For another look at this topic you can visit this page: