How to store a quince at home

Many gardeners are grown in the backyards of quinces. A tree that produces fruits that look like an apple is very popular among gardeners - with its help you can perfectly plant trees on land and in the fall there are many chances to get a good harvest of tasty fruits. But, having collected a quince, each owner of a quince tree thinks about what to do so that the crop will be preserved until next autumn.

To keep the quince for a long time, we need certain conditions that allow the fruit to lie through the whole winter and not start to rot. There are ways to help keep the quince at least until the spring of next year - they will be discussed.

Rules by which you need to collect a quince

Quince looks very similar to an apple - the same round and yellow-lemon color.Although there are varieties and pear-shaped. Fruit ripens late - after the autumn frosts. The first and most important condition that allows keeping the harvest for a long time is collecting the fruits correctly:

1. Tear fruit from a tree should be carefully and carefully, so that neither the skin nor the flesh was damaged.
2. When picking a quince, it is better to fold it either on the grass, or, if a bucket acts as a container, it is better to lay out the bottom with paper.
3. It is better to remove fruits from a tree late in the morning - by that time dew completely dries out.
4. Harvest should be when the street is dry and sunny weather. Otherwise, wet fruits will rot and deteriorate.

Fallen and lying under a tree fruits need to be processed first of all, otherwise they can quickly deteriorate and disappear.

Purchase quince

Not everyone has the opportunity to grow a quince on the site and wait for the harvest. However, this is not a problem at all, because it is not at all difficult to buy a quince in the market or in any of the many shops.

It is best to buy a quince in the second half of October - early November, when the fruit matures and is removed from the tree.When choosing, you must carefully observe the following rules:

1. The fruit must have a smooth and smooth skin, without bruises, scratches, rotten and moldy areas, otherwise it will be stored for a very short time.
2. When choosing fruits you need to focus on the color - it should be rich lemon or yellow. This color speaks of maturity.
3. It is best to choose the fruits of large or at least medium size - often small quince is sour, tasteless and dry.

Conditions under which the quince is stored for a long time

Is it possible to store a quince at home so that it does not lose its taste, for a long time, gain freshness and lose juiciness? You can, here's what you need:

1. A temperature of three to four degrees of heat should always be maintained at the storage location.
2. Best of all, if the room is wet, it is desirable to maintain a high level of humidity - up to 85 percent.
3. It is desirable that sunlight does not penetrate into the storage room, it is better if it is dark at all.

Cold storage

If you choose a refrigerator for storing a quince, the fruit in it keeps its juiciness for a long time, remains as tasty and does not rot for a long time.Fruits are stored at the very bottom of the refrigerator - in vegetable boxes. There there are all the necessary conditions that allow to store the product - the desired temperature (3-5 degrees), darkness and quite high humidity.

For longer storage, do not be lazy, but wrap each fruit in a paper or foil wrapper. Then the fruit will lie down for 70 days without harming itself. If the temperature in the fridge is lowered and brought to zero degrees, then the quince will last much longer - more than four months. Accordingly, when the temperature rises, it will not be stored for so long.

In the cold

If the fruits of quince freeze, then they lose their hardness, become softer and less astringent. Quince fruits can tolerate frost fairly well, so they are often stored in freezers.

Before you put a quince there, the fruit must be thoroughly washed, cleaned of fluff. Then they are cut into two halves, the seeds and the core are removed, and the halves are cut into slices. For long-term storage they resort to shock freezing, it is done this way: the sliced ​​fruit is put into bags of polyethylene, the air is released from there, well tied, and bags are placed in the freezer.

After 20-24 hours, when the fruit is completely frozen, they are taken out of the bags and placed in a container, which is closed with a lid, put again in the cold. In a frozen form, a quince can stand for a long time - until the next fall, until a new crop appears.

It is advisable to eat it before this time, because in a year the fruits are completely frozen, losing their juiciness and becoming dry. It is advisable to sort the fruit in such a way that it can be reached in small portions, because it is undesirable to freeze the thawed quince again - it will become completely tasteless and completely lose all the qualities considered useful.

How to store seeds

After sending the sliced ​​fruit into the freezer, the seeds removed from the fruit remain. Diligent owners leave them and store until spring comes in order to plant in the ground and grow a new tree.

Seeds are placed in wet sand, all this is poured into a bag, air is removed from it, and then tied. The bag can be placed in the same vegetable-fruit box, where the seeds will live fine until spring. With the onset of spring heat they are planted in the nutrient mixture and germinated.

From time to time, seeds must be inspected and checked to see if rotting or mold has begun, and spoiled ones should be discarded immediately. You also need to look at how wet the sand is. Having seen that it dried up, it is possible to moisten it, using a spray gun.

How to store in the cellar

For owners of the cellar, garage or basement, storage in this room will be a very good solution, because it is impossible to fit everything in the refrigerator or in the freezer.

In order quince survived the winter normally in the cellar conditions, it is necessary to create a microclimate described a little higher. I.e:

1. Constant temperature regime without fluctuations and differences, so that the temperature varied at the level of plus 3-5 degrees.
2. High stable humidity - 70-85 percent.
3. The ability to ventilate the room so that the air does not stagnate, but alternates.

It is best to pretreat the room beforehand - irradiate the lamp with quartz or scatter slaked lime over the area. Then all the germs and parasites will die, and the fruit will deteriorate and rot less.

Storage preparation

1. We need to start with the fact that we need to select low-quality fruits - fruits that contain damage, cuts or signs of rotting, can provoke good quality fruits to inevitable damage.
2. Each fruit is rubbed with a piece of dry cloth. It is not necessary to wash the fruit at all - this significantly reduces storage time.
3. It will not be superfluous to pack the fruit in wooden or cardboard boxes. It is desirable that the container had cells or compartments.
4. It has already been said that it is possible to wrap each fruit with foil and paper. Other experienced gardeners pour sawdust between fruits or lay a quince in several layers, alternating each of them with paper.
5. During storage, it is sometimes necessary to sort out the fruit, looking for spoiled fruit - they should be immediately seized and eaten.
6. Another point - the neighborhood with other fruits. So, it is undesirable to keep a quince next to a pear, because it allocates essential oils, provoking the early maturation of quince. The best neighbors are apples.

Storage to ripen the fruit

If you plan to store a quince in the home, then you need to remember - only those that have reached ripeness can be stored for a long time.It is for ripened ripe fruit that all the conditions and rules are given above.

If the quince is harvested immature, then in order for it to reach edible condition, you need an important condition - a constant temperature of 23 to 25 degrees. If the temperature is lower, then the quince will not ripen. Or stay in the cellar of the same green, or begin to deteriorate.

And it is important - there should be no drafts and the rays of the Sun falling on the fruit, it is better that the place was dark. Then the quince will ripen evenly, and the flesh will be juicy and pleasant to taste. To reach ripeness, you need 10-12 days, then you need to either eat the fruit immediately, or remove it for storage.

You can store a quince in several ways - it all depends on the condition of the fruit and the shelf life. Using any of the methods described, it is possible to provide the family with tasty fruits for the winter period for a long time.

Video: quince preservation process for the winter