Comment on What would be ancient ways to properly store vitamin C?

• czardestructo@lemmy.world ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  Lemons if stored correctly will last 10 months. My grand father would just toss them in a dark storage room in Greece and they lasted until the next harvest.

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  • rumschlumpel@feddit.org ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    What exactly does “stored correctly” mean? I assume dry and cool?

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    • czardestructo@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Cool and dark, he would just toss them in baskets in a dark space that didn’t even stay that cool. He might have picked them before they were ripe but I dont remember.

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      • rumschlumpel@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        The issue with recreating that environment on a wooden boat is that the sea is really, really wet. Sailing boats definitely had issues with spoiling citrus fruit, it’s part of why they switched to citrus syrup at one point.

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• splendoruranium@infosec.pub ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  Your body only needs tiny amounts of Vitamin C and you can easily store fruit like apples for more than half a year without refrigeration.

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  • Mothra@mander.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    I think the record I’ve seen apples last without refrigeration was two months, three maybe with a fridge. They were shriveled and slimy and gross but still edible. Not sure how well the C preserved, apples aren’t notorious for large quantities of it anyway.

    Citrus is a bit less long lasting, either drying out or succumbing to mold.

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    • splendoruranium@infosec.pub ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      apples aren’t notorious for large quantities of it anyway.

      Yeah, I’ll concede that.
      But again, long storage is not just feasible but relatively trivial - a cool basement, harvest before ripe, many months of apples to be had. Maybe it depends on the cultivar? Either way, for most of human existence in seasonally cold climates, storage simply was the only way for having access to fruit during winter and early spring.

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      • idiomaddict@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Preserving has been an option for much of our history and it works much better than just storage.

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  • rumschlumpel@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    On a boat, possibly in the tropics, without spoiling? Doubt.

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    • splendoruranium@infosec.pub ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      On a boat, possibly in the tropics, without spoiling? Doubt.

      Huh, “sailors” indeed. I can honestly say that I hadn’t noticed this was about boats up until now.

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