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This is a little sac like the ones that contain silica gel desiccant, but it contains a little bit of activated charcoal to adsorb the ethylene gas that fruit produces as it ripens.
Supermarkets stick these in high-priced fruits that are often sold in sealed containers (e.g., berries) to increase
shelf-life. After you take the package home, you eat the fruit and throw out the packet.
http://www.y-carbon...kRef=food_packaging
[ytk, Apr 17 2012]
Ethylene
http://plantphys.in...logy/ethylene.shtml
Mentions activated charcoal and potassium permanganate as ethylene removers. [spidermother, Apr 19 2012]
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Annotation:
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Or eat the packet, to alleviate poisoning /
overindulgence in alcohol / etc. |
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It would be slightly cooler for your fruit bowl to have a flare stack, like oil rigs do, to burn off the unwanted ethylene. |
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The gas that bananas give off is ethyl ethanoate,
from memory. Going back to the late 1970s for
possibly dodgy memory... I'll check. |
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Nope, 3-methylbutyl acetate. Sorry. |
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Ethyl ethanoate has applications as a solvent for
decaffeinating tea and coffee. Didn't know that. |
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[UnaBubba] You're thinking of the ester that (largely) gives bananas their smell. They _also_ give off ethylene. |
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Yep. It was 1979 when we looked at esters in
chemistry and I've not really had any need to use the
information again. Please excuse my faulty memory. |
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hmmm... just thinkin' 'bout that ethylene gas... couldn't you bubble it through some chlorinated water to produce ethylene oxide? That seems sufficiently useful, toxic, and explosive that it ought to be a standard part of a halfbaker's armamentarium. |
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This is a slick idea and easily testable for a science fair project, ideally using time lapse photography. Two cake dishes with bananas, one with several packets of charcoal and one without. Do they ripen at different speeds? |
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