Open a Pomegranate

Since pomegranates are still in season it is a really great time to enjoy them!  This time of year most grocery stores carry them and they are easy to find.  I suspect that a lot of people don’t know how to open pomegranates and eat them easily, so they either avoid them because they are inconvenient to eat, or pay top dollar for arils (the pomegranate seeds) that are already removed.  I don’t know about you guys, but I used to be one of these people!! Then I found a pamphlet at a grocery store that explained how to open a pomegranate.  I tried it out myself and now, I eat pomegranates often and they are absolutely delicious!  They also are full of antioxidants and a healthy, zero WWPP snack!  I thought for this blog post I would share with you all, how I open pomegranates, so you all can enjoy them too!  I hope you enjoy!

So to start you need a pomegranate, a sharp knife, a bowl of water, and a cutting board, preferably with a groove around the edge to catch excess juice.  When choosing a pomegranate, look for a fruit that has a smooth red skin, and make sure you choose a heavy fruit.  This makes sure that your pomegranate will have a lot of arils.

The process is as follows:

1. Cut off the top of the pomegranate.  Hold the top of the pomegranate over the bowl of water and scrape out all the arils into the water.  Discard the left over rind.  You will now be left with most of the fruit.  When you look at the top you will see that the pomegranate is divided into sections as is shown in the picture below.
2. Cut one of the sections out and scrape all of the arils out into the bowl of water.  Don’t worry about getting pieces of the white membrane into the water.  This is not a problem.  Repeat this process for the other sections.  Once you get about halfway done I like to just take the whole half and scrape all the arils out together.  Discard all of the left over rinds.  At this point you will be left with a bowl of water where pieces of white membrane float to the top, and the yummy arils sink to the bottom.

   

3. Using a slotted spoon, scoop the white membrane pieces out of the bowl.

   

4. Pour the remaining contents of the bowl into a colander, and voila!  You are left with tasty pomegranate arils that you can eat with a spoon!

Store these in an air tight container and the refrigerator and they can last for over a week!  I like to eat pomegranates, over a bowl of cereal or oatmeal.  They also taste good mixed with some plain yogurt… and certainly you can have a bowl of just plain pomegranate as a healthy snack!