posted
I don't have machete, and this seems like the best of my cutting implements to use. It's not very sharp anymore, it's been battle scarred. I want the coconut halves to come out intact and fairly even in size.
posted
I've always heard its not the size of the blade but how well you swing it that determines if you can split the coconut.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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We used to drill holes (with an icepick?) to sort of weaken the shell along a faultline, and then it was more likely to split along that seam.
I think Mother used an axe. Short sword sounds ... well, useful, so long as you are careful with the roll-y thing you are cutting. Maybe do some holes and then place the tip of the short sword in one of them, poise it, and whack it with a hammer? (Otherwise, if you are doing the "hiii-yah!" thing, be careful the blade doesn't shear off and slice into a body part.)
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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posted
And then you have to clean your blade extra-carefully, what with the tarnish and all.
[I always read innuendo into Dan_raven's posts. I am also horrified at myself for reading double entendre into skillery's heartfelt post on the Pope John Paul thread, and I'm considering what due penance would be. I think I'm going to assign myself to clean out the closet. That'll fix me. ]
posted
I hope you read some innuendo into my post. It took me hours of patient folding and packing to stuff it in there.
Cleaving always reminds me of the only good line in "Beastmaster II" (Subtitle was "Direct to Video" I believe.)
Well endowed female villian, "Why do you hero's keep threatening to cleave my bosum in twain? I think it cleaves well enough as it is. Don't you?"
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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This is the last time I tell my son, "Weigh it, and if you figure out the price within 10 cents, I'll buy it for you."
Posts: 1021 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Has anybody here really ever personally opened coconuts this way? Cuz whatcha see on tv/movies can be deceptive. Unless the shell is "just off the tree" fresh -- which ain't likely from most grocery stores -- it sounds like a way to shatter a coconut into many pieces. While risking personal injury.
I'd mark a circumference around the middle by setting the pen/pencil on top of a cup/etc of appropriate height, then spinning the coconut against the pen/pencil tip. Use a saw -- cross-cut blade or a wood-cutting hacksaw blade -- on the marked circumference to cut through the shell just to the white. Rinse clean to get rid of the shell bits/dust. Then use a regular knive to cut through the meat.
posted
And I go bowling with coconuts. Rolling 'em against concrete steps, against the house footing in a lower-level garage, etc. Never hard, just repeatedly until it cracks. Or just tap tap tap around the coconut with a steel pipe or the peening end of a hammer until the shell cracks. Most of the time the crack will circumnavigate the shell until it terminates upon self-intersection. Leaving two halves of a broken shell with the meat intact.
The problem being I can't finely control where the crack starts. Nor have meaningful control of the directions in which the two ends of the crack run, nor whether the crack runs on a single flat plane. Then even with the shell cracked, it's a lot harder to cut through the meat when the two shell halves' edges are still held tightly together by the meat.
You specified two approximately equal coconut halves, which my bowling or tap tap tapping methods would be unlikely to provide.
posted
Dunno. And they don't explain their techniques, so it wouldn't be worth buying just for that.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
My sister (the coconut nut) throws them down the stairs outside to crack them open. You have to throw it hard against the ground, but it works everytime.
If she wants the milk, she takes a power drill, drills a hole, drains the milk and then proceeds to throw it down. I think she just likes to make it more dramatic. Posts: 862 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I am also horrified at myself for reading double entendre into skillery's heartfelt post on the Pope John Paul thread, and I'm considering what due penance would be. I think I'm going to assign myself to clean out the closet. That'll fix me. ![[No No]](graemlins/nono.gif)
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