As my teeth have declined recently, I've been switching to softer and softer foods (no more apples and ginger snaps… boo hoo).  Grapes on the other hand can be reduced to mush with relatively little pressure so I can still consume them, and while not the healthiest of the fruity snacks, are still marginally better for you than say, spice drops.  At least that's what I tell myself.  I try to eat a banana every day too… lots of potassium and stuff.

Anyway, the thing with grapes is some of them come off the bunch looking pretty nasty, and sometimes I end up throwing away grapes that might still be good.  The sorts of defects I've noticed are:

• Raised whitish puffy areas, usually at the stem-end of the grape (overripe?)
• Brownish bark-like scabs (healed injuries?)
• Brownish discoloration under the surface in regions (bruises?)
• Cracks in the skin that seem to have separated and pulled back (overripe?)
• Bore holes in the surface, usually round and extending a few millimeters inside (eaten by an insect?)
• Shriveling (grape is dead and drying out?)
• Slime/fungus (yechhh!)
• Portions have turned to brown mush (rotten)

For pretty much any of these defects I tend to toss a grape away. Although for the first three, if the affected area is very small or effected in only a slight manner, I may still eat the grape, possibly avoiding the affected area.  But I don't know what really causes any of these things and possibly all of them are safe to eat (except maybe the slimey, fungus-covered variety).  Does anyone else know?

It occurred to me I may be worrying too much.  After all I eat raisins, and it's a fair bet that a grape with any but the last two defects probably shrivels up into a decent raisin where the defect would be much harder to detect.  Therefore, I probably have in fact consumed many a raisin which came from a grape I would have discarded.

How do YOU tell a good grape from a bad grape?