TikTok Taught Me: The Paper Towel Trick Works for Keeping Berries Fresh Too?

When you're grocery shopping, eating a pint of blueberries or a quart of strawberries sounds like an easy task. Yet, somehow, week after week we're constantly throwing away moldy berries. We know we're tired of wasting food, so we're sure you're sick of it too.

That's why we're constantly searching for ways to keep produce fresh for longer. Groceries aren't cheap, so if we can stretch those berries just a few extra days, it's worth it to try.

We were first introduced to TikTok's paper towel trick as a way to keep lettuce and other leafy greens that come in clamshells fresh for longer. Spoiler alert: it worked really well and the greens lasted 15 to 20 days past their best-by dates.

Then, we saw another TikTok using the same hack, but with berries. If you don't know, the paper towel trick is simply placing a paper towel over the top of the berries in the clamshell, then storing them upside down in your fridge.

It was a no-brainer, we knew we had to try it. If it worked with lettuce, it has to work with berries right? This is what we discovered.

How to Make Berries Last Longer

Just like with the lettuce, once you bring your berries home, open the container, place a paper towel over top of them, and store them in the fridge upside down. Make sure to wash the berries when you're ready to eat them but don't wash the whole container before storing as that adds extra unwanted moisture.

Most berry containers have an absorbent pad on the bottom, which is supposed to catch the moisture and keep it off the fruit. However, a lot of times the absorbent pad is already soaked through when you buy your berries — so it can't really do its job.

Storing the berries with a paper towel will act as a fresh absorbent pad and keep the moisture off the fruit.

Putting the Paper Towel Trick to the Test

To test if this method actually works for keeping berries fresh for longer, we tried it on strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries.

The strawberries without the paper towel lasted for six days. The raspberries without the paper towel lasted for nine days before they began to dry out. The blueberries without the paper towel lasted for 20 days.

The strawberries with the paper towel lasted for eight days. The raspberries with the paper towel lasted for 11 days before they began to dry out. The blueberries with the paper towel lasted for 24 days.

Note: once the berries looked like they were on their last leg, we placed them in the freezer to preserve them for longer. That way we can keep using them later on for smoothies or other frozen berry recipes.

While the berries in the original packaging started to get mushy, the berries with the paper towel remained firm for much longer. The blueberries especially remained nice and plump.

The paper towel in the strawberry and raspberry containers gets dyed red and retains some moisture after a few days. Once that happened, we replaced it with a fresh paper towel to ensure it was keeping the most amount of moisture away from the berries as possible.

Raspberries are pretty delicate, so if the container is too full to start, we recommend eating a few berries before adding the paper towel. That way when you add the paper towel, it won't crush any berries.

Obviously, this hack doesn't always produce the same 20-day shelf life our lettuce had. But, it does work to keep fruit fresh and enjoyable for a few extra days — and sometimes that's all you need to finish up the package.