Comment by klmr | Hacker News Reader

Comment by klmr | Hacker News Reader

> Know what happens to most of the produce that's edible, has enough shape to survive in transit, but looks funny?

> IT GOES TO THE GROCERY STORES THAT POOR PEOPLE SHOP AT

So I shop a lot at “grocery stores that poor people shop at” (in Europe, for what it’s worth; maybe the US is different). And the produce sold there is, for the most part, very different from the “ugly” fruit and veg that sustainability hipsters are talking about.

Here’s what produce is sold at “poor people stores”: plasticky, perfect-looking, and utterly tasteless. Yes, there’s a lot of waste because a lot of it gets squashed and mouldy. But nobody is talking about selling that stuff because it’s genuinely bad.

Some greengrocers do sell cheap “ugly” produce but the vast majority that lands in discount super markets isn’t ugly, it’s just incredibly bad quality.

I don’t know what this means for her argument vs the food hipsters. But I find her condescension towards people who don’t know how poor people shop, coupled with apparent misinformation, extremely alienating.

Also oversized to compensate for the low price-per-kilogram

Supersizing produce for economic reasons is a myth.

Oversized fruits and vegetables mostly exist because they were "missed" during the previous harvesting round. A cucumber that is ripe but isn't harvested because it was hiding behind some leaves, will be oversized the next day. Same goes for a lot of other produce.

Farmers receive the highest price for produce that's the "right" size. Other sizes will be auctioned off with a lower quality rating and get a lower price per kg. Also, the boxes are made for regular sizes and they can be packed more efficiently.

If a supermarket sells inferior products for a higher price, it's because the supermarket wants to do that and not because the other parts of the market chain force them to.

> A cucumber that is ripe but isn't harvested because it was hiding behind some leaves, will be oversized the next day.

A year ago I would've shrugged this off as an exaggeration, but after my wife decided to grow cucumbers last summer I've seen first hand how fast those things grow.

Feel lazy one day, wake up to little shop of horrors the next.

A farm up the hill from where I live produces eggs from several thousand free-range chickens, and they sell them on site with a vending machine by the dozen. They also sell "catering" eggs in trays of 30, for under half the price of a dozen standard eggs. These are irregular shapes (too elongated for "large" egg boxes) and double-yolk eggs. All perfectly tasty and edible, but cosmetically unsaleable. I'm happy to take advantage of the opportunity to buy them!

At the same time, it's also good to know that there's no wastage here. All the non-standard produce goes into cakes, quiches and other commercial products where the appearance isn't noticeable.

I've always been curious how people bake with non-standard size eggs. How do you translate a recipe that calls for "3 eggs" when your egg sizes are all different?

Most recipes are very lax in their quantities. The size of an egg doesn't usually make much difference, at least for the cooking and baking I do.

For the most part, they are a mixture of sizes including both large and small, so it usually evens out. They are rejects primarily because of shape (can't be packaged in standard containers, too long and they would break when the lid was closed; too small and they would move around and crack) or because they have double yolks (purely cosmetic). The cosmetic look was a bit offputting at first--we are all used to the expected appearance with a single yolk--but it makes zero difference to the taste.

Cooking ≠ baking. For baking small changes in relative quantities can actually make a huge difference — maybe not for your simple cake batter but definitely for more elaborate bakes, and even relatively simple standards such as brioche dough. It won’t ruin the result but it will change the outcome.

it sounds like the poorer quality produce you're describing is just coming from lower quality farms?

I have no clue how the supply chain works, but I don't think produce from the same source is separated by the quality you're describing.

It generally is, almost all produce is graded and sold by its grade.

my original post wasn't clear.

what I meant was one farm generally wouldn't have a crop that yields "great" produce that tastes great while simultaneously having produce that is:

> plasticky, perfect-looking, and utterly tasteless.

these would generally come from completely different crops and farms.

I understand that produce is graded by physical appearance but that produce of varying condition from the same crop would pretty much taste the same, which leads to the whole discussion about ugly produce.

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