How to Pick the Perfect Pineapple {+Pineapple Recipes}

I absolutely love fresh pineapple! From just eating it freshly cut to eating it on pizza, it’s one of my favorite fruits.

Though I love eating fresh pineapple I have always had a hard time picking ripe, sweet, and juicy fruit. So I leave the fresh fruit selection up to Jared as much as possible.

In this post I’m excited to share with you how to pick a perfect pineapple as well as some delicious Pineapple recipes you don’t want to miss.

Do you have a tough time picking a good pineapple? Today Jared is going to share how he picks out a pineapple. (He always picks the best Pineapples.)

I don’t know if he is just lucky or if working the produce department in high school really did teach him how to pick the perfect pineapple. 

Some Fun Facts About Pineapples

Pineapples have a unique history no one knows when the first pineapple was taken to Hawaii, and Christopher Columbus brought one back to Europe from South America.

Today this delicious fruit has been cultivated and grown in many different countries, the top producing country in 2014 was Costa Rica.

Smithsonian.com shares that only 400 million of the 300 billion pineapples farmed worldwide come from Hawaii.

That’s only 0.13 % of all pineapples that come from Hawaii. (That doesn’t stop me from wanting to visit the Dole Plantation!)

Okay, enough history! Next time you go to the grocery store, here are a few tips to help you pick a juice, sweet Pineapple.

Things to Look for When Picking a Pineapple

#1 Color

The first thing you want to look for when picking a pineapple is the Color.

Many pineapples you see in the store are green, you want to pick a pineapple that has a nice YELLOW color.

If they are green they aren’t quite ripe enough and will be hard and have a more tart taste.

#2 Pull a Leaf

An old trick to know if the pineapple is ripe is to be able to easily PULL a leaf out with little effort. The fruit will be slightly soft when it is ripe.

Related Post: How to pick the best watermelon.

#3 Smell

One of the best ways to know how the pineapple will taste before you buy it is to SMELL the base, not the leaves!

It should smell like sweet pineapple tastes. If it smells overly sweet it’s probably overly ripe and will have a mushier.

If you can’t smell anything then it’s most likely not ripe and won’t be sweet or have much taste at all.

So next time you buy a pineapple remember: YELLOW in color, Pull out a LEAF easily, and SMELL the sweetness from the base.

Now that you know how to pick a perfect pineapple here are some delicious pineapple recipes that you really need to try.

Post originally published in 2016.

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