File this under "common sense is no longer common"

This is depressing.

What you see, to the left, is "RipeSense" packaging. It's new to Canada (or Ontario...at the very least Toronto).

There's a sensor in the plastic that gauges the fruit's ethylene off-gassing (or according to the company "the flavour" (what's the plastic doing, licking the fruit to taste when it's ready to eat?...I don't want to eat pears covered in packaging slobber...who knows what else they've licked)) and then changes the dot's colour to match to the guide's "this colour means this is *this* ripe" colour swatch.

The added bonus to the plastic clamshell is that it protects fruit from bruising.

According to the company spokesperson, people can select the pear at the exact moment of ripeness and "eat it without fear" of biting into a hard or tasteless fruit.

I don't know about you, but I've never been afraid of biting into a hard fruit...because I know when I pick up a pear, I know whether it'll be to my preferred degree of ripeness. Yes, I have *that* special talent.

Okay, I'm being insensitive to all the underripenedfruitophobes in the world, I'm a horrible person and I should go find a therapist to help me be a more loving and tolerant person who's unquestioningly obedient to the whims of marketers...

This is so depressing in so many ways...overpackaging, further separation between foods and eaters...you name it. Has Marthaism really taken that strong a hold on us that we are afraid of imperfect fruit and veg?

Oh, and this extra assistance comes at a price: the pears in the moodring-like clamshell cost almost twice as much as those that you bag yourself.

Thanks, but no. I'll continue using my nose, hands and brains to let me know when that pear is ripe enough to eat.

as always,
jasmine

tags: pears ripesense