So it’s recently come to my attention that cutting avocado can be a dangerous past-time.  In the past month I’ve heard two stories from friends of friends about ending up in the ER due to failed avocado cutting.  Avocado is delicious and full of those healthy fats, potassium, folic acid and various vitamins.  So in case fear of cutting yourself is keeping you from tasty avocados, here’s my step by step for how to cut into this tricky fruit.

First step is picking a ripe avocado.  This is always a little tricky.  The key is to find one that’s soft but not bruised.  This can be challenging in a grocery store where it seems like they’re usually rock hard or way too squishy.  You want an avocado that gives a little, kind of like picking a ripe peach.   I tend to try to buy avocados a couple days before I need to use them and let them ripen on the counter.  If you’re in a rush you can try ripening them in a brown paper bag (like with pears), this should help them ripen faster.

Ok, now that you’re ready to eat your avocado, you’re going to use a sharp knife and cut the avocado in half length-wise.  You’ll just cut around the big seed.  Once you’ve cut all the way around the pit, use a twisting motion with your hands to separate the two halves.

The pit will be on one half.  To remove the pit, carefully use the sharp part of your knife to thwack (technical term) the pit.  This should lodge the knife into the pit, at which point you can twist the knife to pull the pit out of the avocado.  Carefully, pull the avocado pit off of your knife.  If the knife didn’t stick the first time, try thwacking again.  Sound too dangerous?  Use a spoon to scoop the pit out; you’ll probably loose some avocado, but you always want to be safe.

Now you can carefully dice the avocado while it’s still in the peel.  Be careful not to slice through the peel (you can use a butter knife).

Finally, use a spoon to scoop out the diced avocado and enjoy!

Let me know if you have any other how-to questions!