Take your non-dominant hand and cross the thumb over to the base of the pinky finger. Then with your dominant hand index finger, push on the meaty bit of your plam beneath your thumb and remember that feeling—This is the same firmness/softness ratio of a perfectly ripe avocado.

Also salt your damn avocado and don’t eat the rind.

If they're rock solid, they're not ripe yet. If they start to get soft, they're ripe. If they're too soft, they're bad.

One thing not mentioned is look at the top of the avacado. If the stem end is flush with the top, you're going to have a rubbery avacado. If it's bulbous, ie the stem end is off to the side with some of the fruit coming over top, it's going to be a good one. A flush top means the picked it too soon and it will never be good.

My girlfriend tells me I have the magic touch because I usually pick out good ones. The issue I run into more than anything is how volatile any given produce department can be. Some places will only keep rock hard ones stocked, or maybe they have some regular early morning shopper who religiously buys all the ripe ones before you even get there.

If you're the sociable type, schmooze with the produce folks at Kroger/trader joe's and they'll probably be able to tell you when the best time is to come, or maybe they can be assed to leave more not-rock avocados out.

Wiggle the little stalk at the top, if it wiggles nicely, it's ripe. Takes a little to get the feel for wiggle to ripe ratio, but it's a really good indicator.

Two things your restaurant might be doing that you don't at home:

• Spritzing a little lemon on the avocado to keep it looking fresh.
• Salt.

Maybe these will make a difference for you.

I think better if you would take a video of pictures of a new one you bought and share it. Cut it open as well. The price depends on your location and the season. Its hard to describe the perfect softness. But it shouldn't be soft like tomato or a boild eggs. More like a cucumber or an orange.

Again sharing a video you would help alot.

This sounds like my experience with Reid Avocados.. I find Hass way superior. But I let them get so ripe sometimes there's white flecks forming around the stem. Are colour are your avocados when you eat them? Hass avocados go very dark, almost black skinned by the time I eat them Reid Avocados tend to be very bright green, and even still only a darkish green by the time they are ready to eat

Avos can bruise before they are soft. The bruises go sour before the whole fruit is soft. Most grocery stores absolutely abuse the fruits. Find a store that doesn’t. Look for a single layer, not a pyramid, heap, or pile. Costco keeps them in the flat boxes.

Anyway the restaurants buy them wholesale and they’re cared for in nice flat boxes so they can ripen beautifully.

One possibility is that you may be a super taster, it's a dumb name for people who are able to taste Bitter 2. If you often find that you hate the taste of things other people with your same background love, it could be that you are one of us.

Being a super taster is nowhere near as super as it sounds. There's unfortunately no upside to balance out the fact that you will hate the taste of alot of things that taste normal to other people. But at least finding out why helps you to not feel as bad about it. You aren't just a "picky eater" and being forced to eat it really is the equivalent of making a normal person eat dog shit, flavour-wise anyway. Unfortunately nutrient-wise the stuff that tastes incredibly unbelievably terrible to us is some of the healthiest food known to humans, yay another downside!

You know all those kids that "won't eat their vegetables"? Yep. Not to mention it's also possible to be a "strong taster" as well as hypersensory. And the even funner part is it's possible to have all three... ask me how I know that? Yeah... eating food sucks. Even my favourite meals can kind of feel like the tongue equivalent of crossing a mine field with a poorly drawn map.

But at least being a strong taster and being hypersensory do also have pay offs. Positive experiences are substantially more positive to me, as long as they don't cross over the threshold, which with alot of practice does eventually get possible to avoid. Because any sensory experience that crosses that threshold is basically converted into a sensation very similar to pain. Just a very strong and immediate "hey stop doing that thing" type message in your nervous system. I know that last bit makes it just seem more bad, but with practice I can indeed avoid that pretty often. And let me tell you, when you can ride the wave of a sensory experience nearly pegging the meter without actually doing so, the payoff is worth it. Ok, well maybe not worth all of it, but it at least helps weigh against all the negative.

I'm only able to buy a good dark avocado, so I can't help you with the green type. I buy them when they're really soft to the touch, more like the mentioned tomato than like a cucumber, but not so soft that I could deform them. I love putting avocados on bread instead of butter, so I prefer them really soft. I don't use lemon nor salt, I like them just the way they are.

ask if they call their mother

You should ask a friend to prepare an avocado for you. Take yourself out of the equation. If you don't like it then maybe you don't like plain avocado?

I'm so jealous, avocado's are $3 each here.

If they're rock solid you can keep them in a sealed container to ripen faster.

Idk about avocados but try boost and maybe your app won't be bugging so much