I've lived in Florida for most of my almost 77 years, and we've shipped a lot of citrus to friends and family all over the other 49 states. Wrapping each piece of fruit in newspaper was the safest way to insure the fruit was as good when it arrived at the other end as it was when it left us.
I use the same method now when storing my purchased fruit at the supermarkets. I wrap each piece individually in newspaper, but leave the paper open so everything breathes. I do the same thing with potatoes, both sweet as well as baking, and we wrap large sweet onions to refrigerate. We also keep a bag of cooking onions in a dark cabinet, but still add the newspaper. This just keeps the fruits and vegetables separated so that if one begins to go bad, it does not contaminate the rest.
Shipping apples, pears, plums, nectarines and other fruits would be handled just the same. Small fruits such as cherries can be placed in layers with newspaper between layers. I would store them at home the same way. Hope this helps.
By Julia from Boca Raton, FL
If you have your own citrus trees and are picking fruit, don't just pull them from the tree either. Take some nippers so that you can cut about an inch of the stem along with the fruit from the tree. Leaving that small amount of stem on each piece of fruit helps to keep them fresh longer. I think it has something to do with not exposing the stem opening or end.
I agree with all the storing tips suggested by Pookarina. Newspaper is the best of all things to wrap each piece of fruit in prior to storing.
We've never had citrus trees, but I can vouch for the newspaper when shipping any other fruit as well as wrapping each piece for the refrigerator drawers. We even keep onions and potatoes this way in the bottom drawer and they seem to last almost forever.
Thumbs Up! Lee
