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Brown, oxidized guacamole is hardly an appetizing sight. There are many methods, and some actual myths, out there about how best to keep your guacamole fresh and green—from keeping the avocado pit or adding lots of lime juice, to more modernist ingredients and techniques, like sodium bisulfate and vacuum sealing. We wanted to find out if one may be better than rest. The culprit responsible for making your guac gross is the enzyme polyphenol oxidase (PPO). Present in many fruits and vegetables, PPO is activated when exposed to oxygen and initiates a chain of oxidation reactions that ultimately result in brown, red, or gray discolorations. We’ve heard rumors that keeping the avocado pit in the bowl of guac was one of the best methods. The pit protects part of the guacamole’s surface from oxygen exposure, which prevents that enzymatic reaction. But it’s also often considered a magic wand that somehow does even more to slow or stop guac from turning brown. We were skeptical. To see for ourselves if the pit perception was true—or really too good to be true—we dug deep into all the avocado lore and tested 11 of the most used tactics that supposedly keep browning at bay. Check out our results below.