How to Easily Open a Young Coconut

Young coconuts are absolutely delicious way to get your daily serving of coconut water and you don’t have to be at a roadside stand somewhere tropical to enjoy them (although it doesn’t hurt!) because they generally sell them at well-stocked markets. They may look intimidating, but they’re actually easy to open and deliver some of the best coconut water you could ask for.

How to pick your coconut

Pick one that is firm all over and has a nice, even coloration.

Give the coconut a shake. You should not hear any sloshing. Sloshing is a sign that the coconut water may be bad due to a leak or some other imperfection in the coconut. The best ones are completely full.

How to open your coconut

Place the coconut on a good cutting surface and, working from the pointed end of the coconut, use a knife to shave the white exterior off of the coconut.

There is a brown shell inside, so your knife will hit it. Keep shaving until the top of the shell is revealed and you’ve gotten as much white exterior off as possible.

Use a butter knife (it is safer than a big knife) and gently poke at the exposed shell for any soft areas. Most coconuts have an area where the shell is a bit thinner on one side. Once you find one, place the tip of the butter knife in the softer area and give the handle of the knife a firm (but not too hard) hit. It should slide in pretty easily. Use the knife to leverage open the top of the shell.

Once your coconut is open, drink up the coconut water and use a spoon or spatula to scoop out the soft coconut flesh.

Things to keep in mind

If the interior of your coconut is pink or purple hued, it is bad. Don’t eat it.

You could get up to 2 cups of water in your coconut (we did in this one), so keep a generously sized container on hand to catch the juice if you’re not going to drink it right away.

If you are going to drink out of the coconut, you might want to keep it in the fridge for a couple of hours before opening it so that the water will be nice and chilled.