Focus Wednesday: Brown Apples

Sorry this post is a little later than normal. When I scheduled to do it, I thought I had some apples... Opps!

We all have experienced the cut apple turning BROWN... It doesn't affect the taste as much as the appearance. I don't like to eat brown apples.

There are 3 ways that I have tried and know work to prevent browning.

Lemon Juice

Lemon juice is basically liquid citric acid. I feel that lemon juice versus using the powder leaves the apples a little more tart.

It is simple enough to use, cut your apple, add some lemon juice to the container, shake and go.

Citric Acid Powder

I use the Fruit Fresh powder found in the canning section of the store. Just like the lemon juice, add some to the container shake and go! (The bottle does say to mix with water, don't worry about it!)

The Rubber Band

I have seen this trick and always wanted to know, DOES IT WORK? Not as well as the first too. But if you don't have either on hand, or have a citric allergy (How sad!) This will do.

After an hour, I checked the apples I tested with the three methods to show how much browning occurred. 

Lemon Juice after 1 hour

Citric Acid Powder after 1 hour

Rubber Band after 1 hour

As you can see not much browning on the rubber band, but I asked Wonderful Man for his opinion and he said the lemon juice and the citric acid powder looked like fresh cut apples.