I've put away the winter squash until autumn returns, and I'm turning to the summer melons. If I pick up something big and heavy with a thick rind, this time of year, it better be a cantaloupe — not a butternut! But winter squash has a trick to teach summer melons: An easier, faster way of peeling. Here's how I peel my cantaloupe, honeydew, and watermelon these days.
We all have our preferred ways of peeling difficult vegetables, like winter squash and melons, but my favorite method with squash is to cut it in half, then stand it on one end and whittle the rind off with my chef's knife. (See more on this here.) I have found that it is much faster and easier than peeling with a vegetable peeler, or cutting it into chunks, then slicing off the peel.
I realized, however, that this is of course a super way to peel melons as well. When cutting up a big watermelon for a week of snacking, or cantaloupe for a party, I would cut the melon in half and scoop out the seeds. Then I would slice it into strips and laboriously cut the rind off each piece.
Then my sister pointed out that you can cut the melon in half and slice off the rind — just like I do with squash. And she was right; this is so much easier! It was so obvious I felt silly I hadn't tried it before!
Now I don't peel melon any other way; it's even faster and easier to apply this technique to melons. I peeled and sliced up three melons last weekend for a big party — and I did it in record time, thanks to this tip! I also found that I really didn't waste any more of the melon this way. In fact, it was easier to make sure I was slicing all of the tough, chewy rind away.
Do you have any favorite tricks for peeling or slicing melon?
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I always thought it was a Chinese thing since this is the how everyone in my family cuts up their summer melons. But then I got married and saw that it was a Fillipino thing too. Now, clearly, it's just a thing.
This is how I learned to do melons when I was s sous chef at Holiday Inn. I thought this was common knowledge... go figure.
I always cut melons (and other round fruits and veg) this way. However, I just cut a bit off the top and bottom, then halve after I've shaved the skin off. Not that it really matters one way or the other. My chef husband taught me this not only to be easier, but it's also MUCH safer!!
One day, I was at my my parents house watching my Dad try to cut the cantaloupe as it was rolling around the cutting board. I squealed in horror and quickly showed him this basic, simple technique. Now, he tells me each time he cuts a cantaloupe the "right" way. :)
Great idea for cantaloupe and honeydew. For Watermelon, I just cut the melon in half and use an ice cream scoop to make large mellon balls.
@somewhiteguy -- so how did you or your family cut your melons before you were a sous chef?
I thought it was a Chinese thing because even the earliest memories I have of summer melons that my family ate were always prepared like this but it seemed like my non-Chinese friends' families served their melons in wedges or halves with the rind intact.
I would just like to point out that my family is Chinese and we often served in wedges with the rind on, or removed the rind after cutting into wedges.
@shipwrecks -- Ha, that's funny! My mom always impressed upon me that her scrupulous removal of skin, peels, and seeds and any other detritus was a very Chinese thing.
I topped and tailed every last bean sprout my family ever brought into the house from the minute my little hands could handle the task to the day I moved out. And my mom always skinned and deseeded those big globe grapes whenever we ate them. No apple or pear or nubbin of ginger ever went unpeeled in our house.
And all our extended family and (mostly southern) Chinese family friends are the same!
@Slow Lorus--maybe it's peeling EVERYTHING that's Chinese. That is a serious amount of peeling!! Do you still eat everything that way? It seems like way too much work for me.
My mom always cut melons this way and her family has lived in Canada since the 1600's (aka: we're not Chinese, Filipino, or anything other than Canadian). I eat the skin/peel on everything that it is "normal" to eat the skin/peel of though. Apples, grapes, cucumber, etc. In fact, I even eat the seeds and entire core of apples and pears!
This is how I was taught to cut melons when I worked in a kitchen. It's totally the easiest (and most fun) way to do but I always gets crazy looks from people when they seeing me "peeling" a watermelon.
@whatyousay -- It is a serious amount of peeling! Mom ran a serious kitchen! I've held onto many of her practices but I do eat the skin/peel on plenty of things now. Maybe all that peeling is why my mom has the dullest vegetable peelers on earth (yet refuses to let me buy any new ones for her).
She peeled, stoned, and quartered a bunch of fresh plums for me to eat last time I visited. I would never even think to do that. But I also would never consider eating the core plus seeds of an apple under normal circumstances either.