Dear people, let me present to you: the easiest way to open a coconut and get the juice out and flesh out. It’s safe (no axes, no nails) and clean.

1. Pour out the coconut juice (water)
2. Break the coconut open
3. Take the flesh out
4. Doe something nice with the shell

Here’s how:

1. Pour out the cocojuice

Every coconut has three dents, one of which is always softer than the rest. Using a chinese chopstick or screwdriver or anything else long and thin, push through the softest dent. Shake out the coconut water. It’s delicious and healthy. Drink it pure of mix with fruit juice.

2. Break the coconut open

Using a hammer, hold the coconut and start hitting, gently and steadily, around the coconut, following its ‘equator’. Take care: the goal is NOT to break the whole coconut in pieces with three hits. By hitting gently and steadily, you’ll create a weak zone in the coconut’s wall. After a number of hits, the coconut will break open following this line.

3. Take the coconut flesh out

Hold half a coconut and a small sharp knife. Carf in the white coconut flesh, starting in the middle (the bottom) and carfing straight up towards the edge. Repeat until you have around eight lines going up from the center. You now have eight triagular pieces of coconut flesh. Now use the knife to break each triangle loose from the wall. They may come off easily, or it may require some effort and they will be in pieces. The older and drier the coconut, the easier it will be. So in this way, hard is good ;). The white coconut pieces will have a brown skin, you can eat this or shave it off.

4. Do something nice with the shells

Use them for growing sprouts,  fill with potpourri, use in a treehouse. In the tropics, they are used to make ‘stands’ for your feet when climbing a palm tree.

Coconut recipes

What tot do with your freshly cut coconut? Well, this:

Grate/chop: great in pies and desserts and with Indian or Asian dishes (with peanut and/or fried onions, for example).

Roll: make blissballs by chopping and combining dried fruits, raw cacao and nuts or muesli and roll the in coconut flakes.

In pieces, for dipping: serve with marmelade or pureed fruits (banana, mango, pineapple). That’s a healthy snack!