Cookaholics Bulletin Board

Josh - I follow Mary's technique - also use a tea strainer - the same one I use for powdered sugar (washed, of course)

I follow the California avocado website method: half and depit avocado. Cut halves lengthwise into quarters. Peel like a banana (it really does work so long as they are ripe), then slice or chunk. Super fast and less messy than scooping and less dangerous than slicing in the skin (I have cut myself that way...sharp paring knife sliced through flesh, skin, skin and flesh kinda like Frank and that coconut).

#5 - think like a factory line - is one I learned to do long ago when beginning to cook a lot of Chinese food. I often had the same ingredients in a number of dishes - ginger, garlic, scallions, soy sauce, etc. - and I quickly learned than it was most efficient to clean them all, cut all of each up and divide it between plates for each recipe, and measure out each liquid into small containers for eeach recipe. It really does look like a factory line with all these things lined up!

#16 - containers with matching lids - is a great time saver. Odd ball sizes that show up I keep in a box to use for sending things home with friends, or taking to work for others. And another thing with the same idea is mason jars - other containers with the same size lids (or rather two of them) that I store more things in than plastic.

Aha! Now I understand the difference in this advice.

I live in California. If I buy an avocado, the flesh is soft enough that I can slice it using only the weight of the knife ... with a butterknife. So avoiding slicing through the skin requires some delicacy. I think y'all in the rest of the country (except maybe Frank) are dealing with MUCH firmer (and less ripe) avocados.

Most avocados sold here are rock hard and have to sit on the counter until they soften. How I'm going to use them determines how I remove the flesh. I slice them in the shell and sometimes dice them in the shell. I've never cut myself and I use whatever knife is handy. I do think you get neater slices if you slice them in the shell. If I'm going to mash them, I just remove the flesh with a spoon.

My father was from San Francisco and he cut them in half, removed the seed, sprinkled on a little s&p, added a dash of tobasco, and ate them out of the shell. His cousin would send a shoebox full every once in a while and that was a real treat as you couldn't find one any place in the Midwest.

Does anybody still put toothpicks in the seed, balance it on a glass of water, wait for the seed to root and then plant it? Can't tell you how many of those I've done.

fitzie

Josh,

People outside of California can buy ripe avocados, which have soft skins. I simply prefer to slice my avocados in the skin. It's super fast and easy. And, I eat about 3-4 avocados a week.

Amy

P.S. I store my avocados in the fridge...they hold better since I only get to my big market once a week.

Surely you meant to write 'tabasco'?

So right. Tobasco it is. Auto correct got me again.

fitzie

Oh the superiority of San Franciscan produce, that totally explains it. It has nothing to do with going at a poor innocent avocado with such ummm... exuberance that you slice right through the soft flesh, the tough skin, and your hand with a butter knife?

Um, get the point Josh?

Amy