Fit Fruit and Vegetable Wash Test

Summer time means having plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables on your dinner table. There's a new product popping up in grocery store produce sections, promising to wash away pesticides and wax.

Wednesday, August 30th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Summer time means having plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables on your dinner table. There's a new product popping up in grocery store produce sections, promising to wash away pesticides and wax. Itâ€™s called Fit Fruit and Vegetable Wash. â€œAny time we get a new product in, we like to try it first and see how it works,â€ said Reasorâ€™s produce employee Brian Campbell. â€œIt seems to work pretty good. It seems to do what it claims to do."

Consumer 6 tested Fit. First, the spray is designed for large, firmer produce such as tomatoes and apples. Simply spray the liquid on your produce. Then rub each piece of fruit or vegetable with a towel for about 20 seconds. Our tester could see the dirt left on the towel. The final step is to rinse the produce with running water.

Our tester washed the second test batch of fruits and vegetables with water only. Water didn't remove as much dirt as the product which also removed the wax. We used the solution to also wash grapes and strawberries. Soak the fruit in the Fit solution for three minutes. After the allotted time, the water was cloudy and dirty. The final step is to simply rinse the fruit with water.

The Consumer 6 tester washed the second batch of grapes and strawberries only with water. We compared the two samples and showed both of them to KOTV employees for their impressions.
"Wow!! Look at all the dirt that came off of that!," exclaimed KOTV employee Van Endicott.
Some people said the grapes and berries washed with Fit looked and tasted different. "The strawberries taste about the same, but the grapes do taste fresher," said Tom Bennett, KOTV employee.

KOTV employee Kristen Holder asked Consumer 6 what ingredient in Fit makes it different.
We went to an expert to find out. Melissa Adair is a nutritionist with the OSU extension office. She tested Fit on apples and grapes. "There's a difference in the water and thatâ€™s due to the chemicals in the product,â€ explained Adair. â€œItâ€™s not because one got more dirt than another."

Fit will remove the wax, which is a preservative. If you use Fit, you need to eat the produce within a day or two. "There's nothing in the product that would harm you,â€ Adair explained. â€œBut there's not really anything better than washing with water, especially running water. I would say it's not necessary. But if someone feels like it does them a benefit or they see benefit, then it's okay to use. There's nothing in the product that's going to harm any fruit or vegetable," she said.

Fit costs about 25 to 30 cents per wash to use. The product is priced at $5.00 for a spray bottle, $6.00 for the solution, and $13.00 for a starter kit which includes both formulas and three bowls.