Natural Living Cuisine

I got a coconut. Now what?

November 10th, 2007 | by Ingrid

Have you ever cracked opened a coconut? Don’t let its appearance intimidate. It isn’t as difficult as it may appear, at worst it is a bit time consuming but the effort is well worth getting to the fresh treats inside.Okay, gather these tools, you are about to open a coconut. You’ll need:

• Hammer
• Long nail, ice pick, metal skewer, or other sharp implement
• Strainer
• Glass container
• Towel
• Knife
• Cutting board

Getting Coconut Water

Begin by rinsing the coconut with cold water. On one end of the coconut you’ll find three round slightly indented eyes. One eye is the softer and weaker of the three; it’s the point of entry to accessing the nutritious coconut water inside. You’ll need to puncture a hole in the soft eye, which I refer to as The Third Eye, with one of the sharp implements.

One way to achieve this is with a hammer and nail. Place the coconut on a folded towel, then position the nail over the third eye while balancing the coconut in place. Take the hammer and with gentle but firm pressure strike the nail into the eye creating a hole.

I use a corkscrew to do the job. I hold the coconut in one hand, then take my corkscrew and work it into the eye. Then I pull out the corkscrew and repeat but this time focusing on rotating the corkscrew to widen the eye. Widening the eye allows more air in, this helps the coconut water flow out easy.

After you have successfully opened the third eye, turn the coconut over the glass container with strainer in place. The coconut water will drain from the eye and the strainer will catch any particles.

Congrats! That wasn’t too bad. You’ve got coconut water ready for use. It is said that once coconut water is exposed to air, the liquid rapidly loses most of its organoleptic and nutritional characteristics, and begins to ferment, so drink up. Cheers!

Cracking the Coconut

Place the drained coconut in the center of a towel and wrap the towel completely around it. I usually try to position the coconut in the towel so I can hit at or near the seam that runs midway along the length of the coconut.

Make sure to work on a non-breakable surface like wood floors, concrete or cement. Avoid fragile tile surfaces or some countertops.

Take the hammer and hit the coconut hard. Repeat. Avoid hammering wildly, it can create the coconut to bounce. Once the coconut is cracked you might want to hit the larger shards a few more times to break them up further. This makes removing the shell a little easier.

Another technique is to use the other end of the hammer and hit along the seam of the coconut [this applies to the older brown coconuts].

The end results look something like this:

De-shelling Coconut Meat

Take each coconut meat shard and if possible pull the coconut meat away from the shell or use a knife to pry the coconut meat away for the shell.

CAUTION: Be very careful when handling a knife not to cut yourself! Work with the knife pointing away from you or others and cut in the direction away from your fingers and hand.

Take the pieces of coconut meat and place on a cutting board. Using a knife scrap or cut away the thin layer of shell attached to the coconut meat. When finished rinse coconut meat with water to remove any particles.

Voila!

Fresh coconut meat. Enjoy!



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