Are People Getting "Avocado Hands?"

OK, I didn't realize that this is such an issue. It appears that people have been getting injured during the process of  preparing an avocado, especially with slicing their hands, so much so that the medical profession is calling this "avocado hands"!

"Avocado hand," as doctors call it, has prompted the British Association of Plastic Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons to warn people about the practice. Improper slicing could lead to nerve and tendon damage. Not even three-time Academy Award-winning actress Meryl Streep is immune to "avocado hand." 

"People do not anticipate that the avocados they buy can be very ripe and there is minimal understanding of how to handle them," Simon Eccles, a former Royal Society of Medicine president of plastic surgery told The Times of London. Eccles added that his hospital endures a Saturday "post-brunch surge" of such injuries, and he sees four patients each week due to the practice. 

Now, let's be clear, folks. Slicing ANYTHING while holding it in your hand is never a good idea! And with an avocado where you can have quite a variation in the texture of the flesh from fruit to fruit, this makes it even more dangerous.

So how should you prepare an avocado? I always have it on a cutting board. Then I slice it along the pole around the pit, i.e. I slice the knife down from the top of the fruit until I get to the pit. Then I turn the fruit, letting the knife goes around the pit, until I have gone all the way around.

After that, all I need to do is twist the two halves and they will separate. The pit will be stuck on one half, and you can use a spoon to scoop it out. Or do what I do. Place the half with the pit on the cutting board with the pit sticking up, and give a slight whack with the knife onto the pit just enough that the knife blade is slightly embedded into the pit. Then twist the knife, and the pit should become loosen from the avocado half.

To remove the avocado from the skin, use a large dinner spoon and scoop around the fruit in between the soft flesh and the skin, and the avocado should separate from the skin. And voila, you have an avocado half ready to be used!

Zz.