The Best Way To Clean Fruit And Vegetables Naturally

Posted on December 27, 2015 By Christene

Cleaning your fresh fruit and vegetables is highly recommended even when you buy organic.  This article will outline some of the reasons why and the best way to clean your fruit and vegetables naturally.

 

Why Wash Your Fruits & Vegetables?

There are four main reasons why you should wash your fruits and vegetables even if they are organic.

1.  To remove any organic matter (such as animal manures), bacteria or mold that the produce has come into contact with during the growing process.

2.  To remove any chemical pesticide, fertilizers or herbicide residues that have been used during the commercial growing process.

3.  To increase the longevity of the produce once harvested.

4.  To remove any contaminants that have been acquired by being handled multiple times from picking, packing, transporting and purchasing process.

 

The best ways to wash your fruit and vegetables naturally.

This video will give you some ideas on what you can wash your fruits and vegetables with.

Vegetable Wash

When choosing a vegetable wash, it is important that the ingredients are edible, organic and non-toxic.  It is pointless to use a vegetable wash full of harmful chemicals – you may as well take your chances with un-washed produce.

The vegetable wash I use works by attracting the harmful elements such as bacteria, pesticides and molds away from the produce and sticks to the water particles.  For hard skinned fruits and vegetables, such as potatoes, apples, carrots and sweet potatoes I use a brush as well to assist.

The vegetable wash will contain dilution and best use information on the container.

Vinegar/Apple Cider Vinegar

Is inexpensive and readily available.  These two ingredients are excellent at removing mold spores from your produce.  Can use these two items as a spritz or as a soak to clean your fruits and vegetables.

A spritz is ideal if your only cleaning one or two items, if you have a large amount then the soak method is recommended.

To use as a spritz dilute tablespoon of apple cider vinegar/vinegar with one table spoon of filtered/distilled water.  Shake to mix in spritz bottle, spray your item and them rub with hand, brush or textured cloth, rinse and your ready to go.

For soaking method, dilute 1 part apple cider vinegar/vinegar to 3 parts filtered/distilled water in a bowl or clean sink.  Place your produce in this solution and rub with your hand, brush or textured cloth.

You will find that recipes will vary from person to person, you can use this as a guide.  Some recommend soaking your produce, while others don’t.  I use this as a guide – for produce such as celery/strawberries that drinks and takes up a lot of water, I do not soak because it can actually draw up the contaminants in the washing water.  As a general rule of thumb, I don’t allow anything to soak for anymore than 5 minutes.  I place the batch of items such as my apples in the water and start washing immediately, then rinse and drain straight away.

Bi-Carb Soda

Is really good for removing the waxy coating you find on your fruits and vegetables.  You can add a couple of tablespoons to your vinegar solution, or use it dry on your produce as a scrub and then rinse.  This method I have seen it used on items such as cucumbers and apples – so your hard skinned produce.

Lemon/Orange Juice

Before researching for this article, I had never even thought about using lemon or orange juice to clean fresh produce.  Lemon and orange juice is antimicrobial, so is perfect for removing germs and bacterial from your fresh produce.  It can be added to other ingredients such as bi-carb soda and vinegar wash to give it extra zoom!

Create a spritz by adding 1 tablespoon of lemon/orange juice to 2 tablespoons of bi-carb soda and 1 cup of distilled/filtered water and mix thoroughly.  Place in a spritz bottle and spray your items and rub with either your hand, brush or textured cloth.  Rinse and drain.

Brush/Textured Cloth

For items that have a hard skin or grooves in their skin, using a brush or textured cloth can assist with cleaning more thoroughly than just rubbing with your hand.  Items that are more delicate and prone to bruising it is best to rub with your hand and be more gentle when washing.

Some produce is even to delicate for rubbing with your hands and you’ll find that the best way to wash these will be placing them in your wash solution and swirling them around briefly before rinsing and then draining.

In Conclusion

As you start to wash your fruits and vegetables regularly, you will find you will develop your own preferred methods.  There is a lot of different information on this subject, use the information as a guide an experiment to find what works best for you and your family.  I encourage my readers to share their experiences so we can all learn from each others knowledge.

Thank you for reading, I hope you found this information useful and I hope to see you again at www.christeneshealthyfood.com

 

References:

http://www.livestrong.com/article/245996-how-to-clean-fruits-vegetables-with-lemon-juice/

http://www.blog.freepeople.com/2014/08/clean-fruits-vegetables-naturally/

 

Raw Foods • Uncategorized • Whole Foods &nbsp &nbsp Clean Fifteen, Cleaning fruits and vegetables, Fruit wash, non-toxic cleaning products, Organic Whole Foods, Raw foods, The Dirty Dozen, Vegetable wash, Whole Food Diet, Whole Food Lifestyle, Why wash fruits and vegetables

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