What you see: Black patches on your relatively recently boiled sweet potatoes.What it is: A harmless chemical reaction within the sweet potato. Eat or toss:
Very odd “holes” in sweet potato
What you see: Superficial holes all over your sweet potato. What it is: Most likely, some kind of insect damage. Eat or toss: The dry, healed sweet potato skin
Black spots on your orange’s peel
What you see: Black dots on your orange peel. What it is: Peel damage of some kind. Eat or toss: If the orange looks and smells good under the peel,
Dark spots on grapefruit peel
What you see: Dark spots on your grapefruit’s peel.What it is: A lot of issues could cause dark spots, but in this case a physical injury is likely.Eat or toss:
Dark, black slightly sunken spots on mango
What you see: A sunken black spot on your mango. What it is: A fungus known as anthracnose.Eat or toss: Cut the affected area off with some relatively generous
How ripe is too ripe for banana bread?
What you see: A banana that is very brown and maybe a bit shriveled. What it is: A very overripe banana. Eat or toss: If you don’t see any signs of microbial
Black around center of banana
What you see: A banana with a very dark center.What it is: Most likely a stressed banana that’s still holding it together.Eat or toss: If it looks normal, but
Black patches on tempeh
What you see: Black areas on your tempeh. What it is: Spores! But not scary ones. Eat or toss: Eat! As long as the tempeh otherwise looks fine and isn’t slimy
Kale with little black spots on stems and leaves
What you see: Black spots or stripes on your kale.What it is: Likely a fungal or bacterial disease. Eat or toss: Trim them off and eat the rest. You can
Little spots on your avocado peel?
What you see: Small black or brown spots on the outside of your avocado, almost like it got a rug burn on the tips of its bumps.What it is: Lenticel damage!
Black patch on top of your broccoli
What you see: Black on top of your broccoli head. What it is: Rot from microbial growth. Eat or toss: Cut off the affected area, with generous margins. Inspect
How can you tell if an avocado is rotten?
Avocados can "go bad" in many different ways. You’ll know an avocado is rotten if you cut into it and discover widespread discoloration in shades of brown, gray
Spots of mold on the bottom of a pineapple?
What you see: Mold on the bottom of your intact pineapple. What it is: Fungal growth on dead plant tissue. Eat or toss: If the rest of the pineapple looks fine,
Twisty, dried brown thing at bottom of banana
What you see: A twisty bit of dried plant material at the end of your banana. What it is: Dried petals!Eat or toss: The banana is still perfectly edible.
Can you eat the dark line or “vein” on shrimp?
What you see: The black line or “vein” on the outer curve of your shrimp. What it is: The shrimp’s digestive tract! It's sometimes called a “sand vein.”Eat or
Moldy eggs
What you see: Your eggs have something unexpected, likely black, growing on the surface or possibly inside the shells. They look like the eggs in the images in
