Anatomy of an Avocado

Kitchen Knife Forums

Help Support Kitchen Knife Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Feb 28, 2011
Messages
6,006
Reaction score
213
2012-09-07-8882c2d.png



With thanks and acknowledgement to The Doghouse Diaries.
 
Lol. Nicely done sir.
Thanks for sharing.
 
For me, the green stuff is pure evil. Can't eat them, they come up again right away...

Stefan
 
How many of you drink avocado 'juice'? It's great. In Indonesia they'll blend it - a little goes a long way - with ice, sugar and a little chocolate syrup.

World's healthiest fruit, no?
 
They make the blended drinks in Vietnamese restaurants around here, I'm sure Cutty Sharp has probably had a bowl of Pho with an avocado juice, great stuff.
 
I eat an avocado 3-4 times a week. I just dress them up with Hungarian paprika, ground pepper, kosher salt, and olive oil. My 1.5-year-old loves them too. I also made avocado ice cream once. It was good, but I seem to remember it being impossibly hard to scoop.

k.
 
They make the blended drinks in Vietnamese restaurants around here, I'm sure Cutty Sharp has probably had a bowl of Pho with an avocado juice, great stuff.

Also love the durian and jackfruit drinks in Vietnamese places, and the syrupy fruit drinks (whole lychee, etc) are okay too. Whew, Pho is filling enough so don't know if I'd go with the advocado!

Love avocado shakes :)

They're really good with way-too-hot food and can extinguish any fires if that happens. Len, they probably taste good with your favourite spiced hummus. :cool2:

I eat an avocado 3-4 times a week. I just dress them up with Hungarian paprika, ground pepper, kosher salt, and olive oil. My 1.5-year-old loves them too. I also made avocado ice cream once. It was good, but I seem to remember it being impossibly hard to scoop.

The ice cream idea sounds promising!
 
Speaking of avacado, some time ago a fellow forum member and I were talking and I recalled a thread on KF about removing avacado pits. There were a bunch of people in the thread crying and moaning about how they refuse to use their nice knives to remove the pit. Some were worried their thin knives would chip or crack. Others claimed their knives would travel completely through the pit and into their palms. I have used my damascus Del to pull out avacado pits and those had to be reground because they were too thin. The guy I was talking to used a yanagi to remove his. Again, no harm done. As for cutting all the way through the pit...well it's not that hard, but when you hold it in your hand, just don't swing that hard silly.

[video=youtube_share;YkMfSinItNE]http://youtu.be/YkMfSinItNE[/video]

http://youtu.be/YkMfSinItNE
 
I used to shy away from using my good knives on avocado pits but no more and I haven't noticed any problems (yet). The big thing is getting the pit off. When the knife is sharper, it goes in further and is sometimes harder to dislodge, so I am usually a bit more careful when dislodging the pit with a good knife.

k.
 
Just pinch the blade behind the pit and roll your fingers forward. The pit will pop right off, and you aren't moving anything toward or even around the edge. Think of it like squeezing a soybean out of it's shell.
 
Just pinch the blade behind the pit and roll your fingers forward. The pit will pop right off, and you aren't moving anything toward or even around the edge. Think of it like squeezing a soybean out of it's shell.

Makes sense; I'll try that. I usually just tap the side of the blade on the cabinet door for my garbage and it falls right in the bin without dealing with the slippery pit. But obviously I don't like to whack the side of my blade too hard.

k.
 
Eamon, not heard that one. I was frustrated with this too.

Honestly these days i'm eating six to ten avocados a week. I like them for breakfast salted with maldon and drenched in lime.

To pit them, I lay the knife down on its side with the pit on it. Then roll the blade pressing against the pit. Go from from lying flat to perpendicular to the board. the pit pushes itself off. Fast, safe and doesn't harm the blade.
 
Just pinch the blade behind the pit and roll your fingers forward. The pit will pop right off, and you aren't moving anything toward or even around the edge. Think of it like squeezing a soybean out of it's shell.

+1 Been using this approach for 5-6 years. It's fast, easy, and safe. Eamon demonstrates the technique ably:

[video=youtube;yXXb-KdKI_U]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXXb-KdKI_U[/video]
 
I also eat avocados about 3-4 times a week. I was so glad for the price to come down on them this year!
Lately I've been throwing em in the Blendtec, they add a nice creaminess to any smoothie.
I had my knife go almost clear through the pit once a few years ago, it scared the heck outta me. I couldn't help but think that if it made though that pit it wasn't stopping till it hit bone.
So now I halve them, then take the side with the pit and halve it again and simply remove the pit with my fingers. It's no real extra work, as I rarely want the halves to remain whole anyway. This way there's no risk of damage to edge nor body.
The exception is when I'm doing say, shrimp stuffed avocados, then one needs clean halves.
 
good vid. I like the thin slice method, though I think I still prefer cutting larger cubes and slices in the skin with a butter knife first and then scooping it out, but I will definitely use that method if an avocado might be older and have bruises or mushy areas.

k.
 
btw, I use that same round cut and twist method with most fruits when I want to remove the pits. Peaches, plums and even cherries -- though you usually can't remove the pits with a knife.

My little girl isn't able to eat pitted fruits yet, but I did this with cherries all summer. I would make one round cut, twist to separate the two halves, then take the half with the pit attached and slice that in half so another non-pitted quarter could be separated. Then I would usually just eat the last quarter with the pit still attached and give the rest to her. Of course I could get a cherry pitter, but the ones I have tried have never worked that well. Plus I get to use a knife doing it this way.

k.
 
Plus I get to use a knife doing it this way.

+1 :)

I've found myself putting more effort in on a lot of cutting tasks lately...effort that isn't really needed, but is noticed...for that very reason.
 
After burying the knife into the pit and twisting it out, you could always put the pit and knife on a cutting board with the pit down and push the rest of the way through the pit. Then throw away the 2 halves.
 
Back
Top