Ripen fruit at room temperature. Once they are ripe, refrigerate. Apples, cherries, grapefruit, grapes, oranges, pineapples, strawberries, tangerines and watermelon are received ripe and should be refrigerated.
If you don't plan to use them quickly, consider storing your oranges in the refrigerator to help them last a few weeks longer. The best option is to keep your oranges whole when storing them in the fridge. This way, the natural peel protects the orange and prevents the fruit from wilting.
At room temperature, oranges can last for about a week. In the fridge, meanwhile, they can stay good for about a month. If you don't plan to eat them within about four weeks, consider freezing your oranges — frozen oranges will keep for up to a year.
Fruits That Should Not Be Stored in the Refrigerator
Apricots, Asian pears, avocado, bananas, guava, kiwis, mangoes, melons, nectarines, papayas, passion fruit, pawpaw, peaches, pears, persimmons, pineapples, plantain, plums, starfruit, soursop, and quince will continue to ripen if left out on the counter.
They can live for a few days to one week at room temperature but popping them in the refrigerator extends that to three or four weeks. To help your oranges stay fresh *and* juicy, there's an easy compromise. Store them in the fridge and bring to room temperature one at a time as you eat them.
Storing: Oranges and other citrus fruits such as lemons, limes, and grapefruits can be stored short-term (up to one week) at room temperature. To prolong the shelf life (up to 3-4 weeks) of citrus fruits, keep them in a bag in the refrigerator.
A 2009 study published in "Family and Consumer Sciences" found that after three days, orange juice stored in the refrigerator retained at least 94 percent of its vitamin C, and after seven days it retained at least 91 percent.
Storing fruit in the fridge
Most fresh fruit, including apples, berries and grapes, will last longer if kept in their original packaging and stored in the crisper of your fridge. Berries can last in the fridge for about a week. It's a good idea to eat as soon as possible so they don't spoil.
They prefer the refrigeration. Apples keep longest when held at 31-36 degrees Fahrenheit. So, you want to keep them in the coolest part of the refrigerator. Most home refrigerators don't get that cold because the rest of your food would freeze, but the colder the better.
Keeping them dry prevents mold growth. Keep oranges in the crisper drawer to stretch their shelf life. Unless you only eat locally-picked fruit, your oranges were on a refrigerated truck then warmed up again in the produce section. That fluctuating temperature makes it susceptible to quick rotting if you leave it out.
They may be stored in a cool, dark spot for a few days, but ideally should be refrigerated to extend shelf life up to 2 weeks.
Storing lemons in the fridge is a great way to extend their shelf life. And if you want to keep lemons fresh for longer than a week, you'll definitely want to refrigerate them.
Store your apples away from oranges
Store apples in the fridge if you want to extend their shelf life. Oranges stored in the fridge (away from apples) should be placed in a mesh bag so that air can circulate around them. Plastic bags will only make oranges moldy.
Store whole mandarins in the crisper drawer of the refrigerator. Or, place mandarins in a bowl and cover loosely with Glad® Press'n Seal® wrap. Store in the refrigerator.
The ideal place to store bananas is on the countertop, where they can ripen naturally. You can refrigerate bananas once they've achieved your ideal level of ripeness; however, refrigerating bananas too soon or for too long can have detrimental effects on your bunch.
Fresh eggs purchased from a farmers market need to be refrigerated as soon as you get home. Per USDA guidelines, eggs should be stored at 40 degrees F or below to help minimize the risk of Salmonella. Eggs should be stored in their carton and placed in the coldest part of the refrigerator, not in the door.
Refrigerate any unconsumed fully ripe tomatoes, but allow them to come to room temperature before serving them. (To speed up this process, slice them while still cold—slices will warm up much more quickly than an intact fruit.) One study we've read suggests that refrigerating for no longer than three days is optimal.
Unless you plan to use the strawberries right away, it's best to store them in your refrigerator to preserve freshness. Unrefrigerated, berries will last only a few days; stored in the fridge, they could last up to a week.
Because strawberries and other fresh berries tend to have mold spores on their surfaces, they spoil faster when left out at room temperature. Keeping them in the fridge slows down this process so you have more time to use them. It's the best option when you need to keep your strawberries for more than a day or so.
Blueberries are the longest lasting of the berry family; if they're allowed to ripen at room temperature and then stored in the fridge, they will keep for up to two weeks. Skip washing them until just before eating, and skip the crisper drawer, too — blueberries stay best in their container on a refrigerator shelf.
One mid-sized orange is enough per day, but if you don't eat enough oranges or want to reach and maintain a certain vitamin C intake level per day, then supplementing your diet with additional vitamin C sources may be necessary.
And with 70 mg of vitamin C in one medium-sized navel orange, per the USDA, one orange is almost all you need to meet your daily dose (according to the National Institutes of Health, the Daily Value for vitamin C is 75 mg for women and 90 mg for men).