No, a bite from the pomegranate fruit won’t doom you to spend a good chunk of the year in the underworld. Not everyone can be Persephone. This sumptuous red fruit generally has a thick skin with a white membrane interior that is filled with juicy pomegranate seeds. When ripe, pomegranates are unmatched, as the seeds contain a deep red juice that has a sweet, somewhat sour taste with a crunch that makes them the perfect topping for yogurt or ice cream, or you can eat them on their own. But breaking into an unripe pomegranate might just make you want to take a trip to see Hades.
An unripe pomegranate is disappointing, to say the least. If a pomegranate is opened before it is fully ripe, the fruit will not be juicy, nor will it have that signature sweet taste. But how, exactly, can you tell if your pomegranate is ripe? The ripeness of a pomegranate isn’t as easy to decipher as an apple, for example, due to its thick skin; and the desired part of its interior (the seeds) are not observable from the outside.
This doesn’t mean that you’ll have to dive into your pomegranates blindly. There are several ways to tell if your pomegranate is ripe for eating, or if it’s best left on the produce aisle (or kitchen counter). So, next time you’re after a pomegranate, follow these tips and you won’t have to risk an unripe fruit.