Talking Nuts
- Thread starter Janne
- Start date
depends on what you mean by "open." if all I want is the coconut water (we call it coconut "milk") I just pierce one or more of the eyes. Yeah, I use a drill if I have one handy but otherwise just bore them with a thin, pointy knife. After that has been extracted we usually use a hammer to get to the coconut meat. In the woods without a hammer, the back of an axe or hatchet (not the sharp side) will do fine.
Yeah, they're double hulled (just like pecans) And just like pecans, we wait for them to ripen --- then that tough, fibrous outer hull opens and the nut (still in the inner hull) falls out to be harvested. I'd never eat a green one; too bitter.
Dried coconut meat is shredded and used to decorate cakes here (imbedded into the icing)
My mother always had a half-rancid bag of shredded coconut in the pantry.
Gourmet and exotic, all-in-one. Gawd! I can still taste it.
She couldn't understand what I liked fresh so much.
Gourmet and exotic, all-in-one. Gawd! I can still taste it.
She couldn't understand what I liked fresh so much.
Nope. Absolutely the same thing. We get the inner mature coconuts with white solid endosperm and the sweet liquid endosperm.
Drink the liquid, OK? Open the "shell", dig out the meat and shred it, let it dry = shredded coconut. Nothing at all to do with coir.
Saw lots and lots of that business back in Fiji.
Coir makes fabulous winter door mats for Canada. I had a coir bed mattress, like sleeping on a cloud.
Freshly opened, I like to use both the liquid and some fresh-shredded meat in fish curry.
Drink the liquid, OK? Open the "shell", dig out the meat and shred it, let it dry = shredded coconut. Nothing at all to do with coir.
Saw lots and lots of that business back in Fiji.
Coir makes fabulous winter door mats for Canada. I had a coir bed mattress, like sleeping on a cloud.
Freshly opened, I like to use both the liquid and some fresh-shredded meat in fish curry.
Oh. Sorry. Green walnuts. Best used as gravel in a driveway. Just gross to taste.
Neighbor up above us on the creek had walnuts, many would float down the creek to my place.
Neighbor up above us on the creek had walnuts, many would float down the creek to my place.
I've carved the hard brown little coconut shell. Very surprised how soft it was and easily worked. ( Making the scoops for salad servers).
Had to put the project down for a week. Those shell pieces had tightened up like bone. Rubbish.
Janne: can you craft bird houses from the full fruits, somehow?
Had to put the project down for a week. Those shell pieces had tightened up like bone. Rubbish.
Janne: can you craft bird houses from the full fruits, somehow?
Have either of you craftsmen encountered Tagua nuts? No idea if they are edible, but they are very carvable by all accounts. Vegetable ivory.
In a garden setting, are falling coconuts not rather hard on anything planted beneath the trees? Or do you just not plant anything within the bombing range?
In a garden setting, are falling coconuts not rather hard on anything planted beneath the trees? Or do you just not plant anything within the bombing range?
Walnuts? Ummm; no. Walnuts fit in your hand and can be opened with just squeezing two of them together. Coconuts are about one third to one half the size of a bowling ball and have three eyes in one end.
We tend to grow coconuts only down in South Florida (in the Keys0 and pecans pretty much everywhere in the Gulf South. No idea where the nearest walnut farm is though.
Last edited:
Judging by the bunch of 6 that smashed through the roof of my bamboo hut in Thailand during a monsoon, yes, they are hard. And had I been on the other side of the bed, I'd have been badly hurt. A guy died while I was out there, laying in a hammock and caught one on his chest. So, yes, don't plant your prize roses under them.
And after helping the Thai family with the drying and seeing all the birds and lizards wandering around on the half shells, pooing etc, I haven't eaten desiccated coconut since. I do like green milk though, very hydrating.
Walnuts are much more temperate zone things like in the New England states. Some in southern BritishColumbia, maybe down to Oregon, at least.
Squeeze 2 ripe ones in your hand and one will always break.
I've looked at Tagua nuts in the Lee Valley woodworking catalog. Maybe power carving with a Dremel? Backed off as I was afraid I would carve right through my thumb at 15,000rpm.
Nobody explains how to hold them and carve at the same time. Appreciate it but never a fan of power carving except for steel branding irons for marking carvings.
I once stayed in a place in Fiji, just an average bure'(?) with a thatched roof maybe 2' thick.
Coconuts bounced off the roof in the night, like kids jumping on the bed. My guts can't do coconut any more.
Squeeze 2 ripe ones in your hand and one will always break.
I've looked at Tagua nuts in the Lee Valley woodworking catalog. Maybe power carving with a Dremel? Backed off as I was afraid I would carve right through my thumb at 15,000rpm.
Nobody explains how to hold them and carve at the same time. Appreciate it but never a fan of power carving except for steel branding irons for marking carvings.
I once stayed in a place in Fiji, just an average bure'(?) with a thatched roof maybe 2' thick.
Coconuts bounced off the roof in the night, like kids jumping on the bed. My guts can't do coconut any more.
