food crops in ways not previously realized application_number US 201313917961 A description the invention is further illustrated by the following non limiting examples it is to be appreciated that although each of the exemplary experiments used potassium phosphite that other salts of phosphorous acid including without limitation ammonium sodium and or calcium salts as well as phosphorous acid itself may also have been used for examples 1 and 2 below assessment of citrus fruit peel color was made using the following color grading charts fig1 for navels fig2 for lemons in addition to the dictionary of color by maerz and paul first edition 1930 all experiments were conducted in solutions at approximately ph 6 although ph ranges from between about 3 and about 9 are acceptable table 1 below sets forth approximate cross references to the dictionary of color for the eight colors of fig1 five different treatments a e below were made there were four replications for each of the five treatments with each replicate comprising six fruit pieces thus each treatment was applied to 24 fruit pieces the fruit treated in this example were green lemons initial color between stage 5 and 6 approx 5 5 at the color break stage possible immersion temperatures can be between approximately 45 u00b0 f 7 u00b0 c and 150 u00b0 f 66 u00b0 c with an ideal temperature of 50 u00b0 f 10 u00b0 c which was used in the trials below a the fruit was immersed in untreated water b the.