Cut the Hassle out of Cutting Peppers
Use your knife wisely to cull the pepper from the seeds
I’ve seen lots of people cut peppers lots of ways, some more effective than others. This method is my favorite; if your knife is sharp and your aim is true, your pepper simply unrolls from the seed core under the gentle influence of your blade.
Begin by slicing down through the pepper outside of the dimple around the stem. As you cut, look at the structure of the pepper: the “meat” of the pepper is held to the seeds by only a few arches of soft, white pith. What you want to do is to sever these arches without disturbing the seeds.
As you reach the bottom of the pepper, turn your knife as you simultaneously roll the pepper. Carefully slice through the pith arches while keeping your knife parallel to the cutting board.
Ideally, the pepper should come apart in one continuous strip with very few seeds accompanying it.
Next, you should remove any tag-along pith from the pepper. The pith is bitter or, in the case of hot peppers, spicy, and is generally considered undesireable for most purposes.
Again with your knife parallel to the cutting board, and again extremely carefully, slide your knife blade between the pith and the pepper. This step is actually a bit easier than it may look because the pith is of a much softer texture than the pepper and therefore slices away from the harder vegetable without much resistance. The main thing you want to be careful of during this step is not to accidentally nick your fingertips with the blade—move them out of the way as it approaches!
Cut the end of the pepper from the seed core for maximum product utilization (in other words, so as not to be wasteful)
Then, slice and dice your pepper according to standard procedure.
Photo credits: Aurora Sharrard
December 5th, 2006 at 6:47 pm
[...] Advanced Knife Skills: Once you’re feeling comfortable with your blade, you’re ready to tackle this technique of separating the meat of the pepper from its seed core in a single cut. [...]