Abstract
Australian fresh market pineapples are generally under-ripe and of inconsistent ripeness for consumers. Skin colour is a poor index of eating quality in pineapples and estimating fru.it ripeness from external characteristics is difficult. A method of grading pineapples for eating quality using fruit specific gravity (SG) was examined each month for 12 months. A quadratic relationship between eating quality and SG was determined with the maximum eating quality occurring at an SG of 0.96-1.004 with little effect of fruit weight or season. Season affected the rate of change of eating quality with SG, with the greatest rate of change occurring in winter and the least in summer. The eating quality of the top portion of the fruit was found to be always less than that of the bottom portion even in over-ripe fruit. The method offers a simple means of grading pineapples for ripeness and its application for commercial marketing is discussed.
