14 MASS. EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETIN 408 



Table 6. Organoleptic Observations on Left-over Peas Stored at 41 "F, 



Sliced tomatoes kept well in covered dishes for two days but spoiled in four 

 days. 



The storage of left-overs in uncovered containers resulted in a loss of aroma, 

 surface drying, discoloration, and a loss in tenderness and flavor of the exposed 

 surfaces at the end of four days. These changes were observed even at humidities 

 as high as 84 percent. 



At humidities between 42 and 60 percent, no significant organoleptic differences 

 in the samples could be detected. However, on and after the second day, food 

 stored at 65 percent relative humidity showed less discoloration, surface drying, 

 etc., than did samples at 51 percent and lower humidities. When the humidities 

 were raised to 84 and 62 percent this difference in quality was evident after the 

 first day of storage. Uncovered foods, although inferior to the corresponding 

 covered samples, were of fair quality when stored for one day at relative humidi- 

 ties up to 75 percent, or for two days at humidities of from 75 to 84 percent. 



Vitamin C Content 



The vitamin C (ascorbic acid) content of the various refrigerated foods is 

 presented in table 7. Because of the wide variations in the rate of loss of vitamin 

 C from different lots of the same vegetable, several determinations were made of 

 the loss in one vegetable (broccoli) stored at various humidities. 



From these data it appears that the rate of loss of vitamin C is much greater 

 during the first day of storage than during the rest of the period. In broccoli for 



