Can we still eat fruit that is only slightly rotten?

Everyone loves to eat fruits, so they buy a large bag and eat them slowly at home. But if you forget about it after a long time, when you look at the fruits again, they may be more or less rotten, and some may even have small mold spots.

There are many people around us who, based on the principle of "not wasting food", would cut off the bad part and eat the rest as usual. But is this approach really feasible?

Image source: unsplash.com Photographer: Jonathan Borba

There are usually two types of rotten fruit. The first is that the fruit has been frozen in the refrigerator or has been bumped during transportation. In this case, it can be eaten, but it must be eaten as soon as possible. Over time, these places will breed bacteria. The second is that the fruit has been stored for too long and has become a little moldy. Even if you cut off the moldy parts of this fruit, it is best not to eat it.

So what are the harms of moldy fruits? When fruits go bad, they often produce a lot of fungal toxins. Take apples, pears and peaches, which we eat most often, for example. When these fruits go bad, they will produce a toxin called "patulin". This is a neurotoxin that can cause acute and chronic food poisoning, making people feel nauseous, have stomach pain, and may even cause diarrhea.

Image source: unsplash.com Photographer: Eva Bronzini

Gansu Agricultural University has conducted research on rotten apples and found that the larger the area of ​​rotten apples, the higher the content of patulin. Moreover, this toxin will spread to the surrounding area, and the farther away, the lower the content. These toxins will spread to the entire fruit, not just the moldy area.

Therefore, it is best to throw away the entire fruit after it rots. If you don’t want to “waste food”, just buy less each time and eat it as soon as possible while it is fresh.

Image source: unsplash.com Photographer: Dagmara Dombrovska

Review | Ruan Guangfeng, Deputy Director of Kexin Food and Health Information Exchange Center